


Circle 1: The City

by Trinket2018



Series: A Ring of Water [1]
Category: NCIS, Numb3rs (TV), Stargate - All Media Types, The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Aliens, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Far Future, Alternate Universe - Sentinels and Guides Are Known, Crossover, Evil!Gibbs, Evil!Ziva - Freeform, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Magic, Pre-Slash, Sentient Atlantis, Tony-centric, many minor crossovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:14:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 20
Words: 134,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28342986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trinket2018/pseuds/Trinket2018
Summary: Humans have survived many catastrophes to get here: the destruction of their home world, the generations-long Exodus through space in their flying ark-ship Atlantis, encounters with dangers too numerous to count, and the melding of their people with another refugee race, the Magicals. But Landing and establishing a colony on Novelle was just the start of their struggle to survive… lucky thing, really, that they brought sentinels and shamans with them. Now they face their most difficult task… living with each other.
Relationships: Anthony DiNozzo & Don Epps, Daniel Jackson/Jack O'Neill, Jim Ellison/Blair Sandburg, Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
Series: A Ring of Water [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2075616
Comments: 38
Kudos: 109
Collections: FavoriteStargateCrossovers





	1. Chapter 1: He had returned, for her.

**Author's Note:**

> READ ME FIRST! This is an ‘Other Lives’ Alternate Universe series, where familiar characters are living totally different lives, in a totally different setting, with mostly different back-grounds, all established in Circle 1. So are the rules for Sentinels, Guides, Shamans, Spirit Guides, Immortals, goa’uld/wraith biology, etc. My AU, my rules.
> 
> Omnibus Crossover. Major crosses for Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1, NCIS, The Sentinel. Minor crosses for Criminal Minds (US TV), Numb3rs, Harry Potter – J.K. Rowling, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Highlander (all media), Forever (TV, 2014), JAG. 
> 
> No canon knowledge is required, since these characters (hopefully recognizable, but adequately described for the uninitiated) are leading ‘Other Lives’ in a far future alternate universe, after the end of the world. The survivors have fled to a colony planet, perched on the knife-edge of extinction. Tony-centric (but Tony is a bit ooc, out-of-character, because… ‘Other Lives’). 
> 
> BE WARNED: Once again, I’ve made Ziva (and her father Eli) into villains, and so is Gibbs for that matter. Mentions of previous child abuse and rape/non-con. I marked this Gen/General audiences, because although I describe M/M relationships, there’s no actual sex, and very little in the way of PDAs. (I’m not comfortable writing the sex stuff, better with UST, character, plot…) 
> 
> Words/phrases for emphasis are in *bold and italics*  
> Non-English words are in *italics*  
> Ship names are in *italics and underlined, eg Puddle Jumper*  
> TV series/movie/book titles are in *‘single quotes, italics, underlined’*

Å 

“For many generations… they obeyed the laws and loved the divine to which they were akin… they reckoned that qualities of character were far more important than their present prosperity. So they bore the burden of their wealth and possessions lightly, and did not let their high standard of living intoxicate them or make them lose their self-control…  
“But when the divine element in them became weakened… and their human traits became predominant, they ceased to be able to carry their prosperity with moderation.”   
~ *Plato, ‘Timaeus’, referring to the legend of Atlantis*

Å 

“[...] Of particular interest is a passage at Edfu [Edfu Building Texts from the Temple of Horus, Egypt] in which we read of a circular, water-filled ‘channel’ surrounding the original sacred domain that lay at the heart of the island of the Primeval Ones-- *a ring of water* that was intended to fortify and protect that domain. In this there is, of course, a direct parallel to Atlantis, where the sacred domain on which stood the temple and palace of the god, whom Plato names as ‘Poseidon’, was likewise surrounded by a ring of water, itself placed in the midst of further such concentric rings separated by rings of land, again with the purpose of fortification and protection.  
“Intriguingly, Plato also hints at the immediate cause of the earthquakes and floods that destroyed Atlantis. In the *‘Timaeus’*, as a prelude to his account of the lost civilization and its demise, he reports that the Egyptian priests from whom Solon received the story began by speaking of a celestial cataclysm: ‘There have been and will be many different calamities to destroy mankind, the greatest of them being by fire and water, lesser ones by countless other means.’”   
~ *Graham Hancock, ‘Magicians of the Gods: The Forgotten Wisdom of Earth's Lost Civilization’, referring to the legends of the Homeland of the ‘Primeval Ones’*

Å 

How could a place of such transcendent beauty as the city-ship of Atlantis, Anthony DiNozzo Junior wondered silently to himself, also hold such a cesspool of corruption within its shining, soaring towers? 

And she *was* transcendent, Tony knew. After all, he was one of the few, dwindling numbers of Lanteans, who could actually hear her whispers in his head. 

Almost five miles across her base, her platform a snowflake shape of piers forming the foundation for the incredible City, she floated on the surface of the Ocean like a jewel. Her towers pierced the sky, silver and shining in the sun. The tallest of them by far, the Central Command Tower, reached seventy stories above, delicate and whimsical as a fairy-tale castle. Below the surface of the water, basement towers plunged almost as deep as the ones above, to anchor and stabilize her motion, making her rocking gentle, even in the roughest tempest. Not only could she float, but, with access to enough power, she could also fly. Her massive star-drive was capable of launching her into orbit and propelling her across space. Her open and fragile-seeming construction was misleading. When her Shield was raised, even the worst tidal waves splashed harmlessly against a milky protective veil that was only visible at such times. 

The City had been ancient, built by some mysterious, nameless and super-advanced race, long, long before his people had stumbled upon her, and claimed her as their own. But her origins and true age were unknown, and the story of how she had been found was lost to time. It was before the destruction of the home-world and subsequent Exodus, for certain, although how long before, no one living knew. 

When the home-world was threatened with an extinction-level event – and what that may have been was also a mystery, long forgotten and lost to time – the survivors built twelve huge Environmental Life-Support Platforms, called ‘Enviros’ or ‘ELP’s, each one half a mile in diameter, to carry as many and as much as they could salvage from the catastrophe. Atlantis became a glorified tug-boat, to drag them all to safety across the vast dark expanses of interstellar space, desperate to find a viable world they could colonize. Well, they *hoped* it would be safety…

The Exodus lasted for generations, braving untold dangers, to cross the hostile interstellar voids. Three Enviros were so damaged in transit that they had to be jettisoned, any survivors rescued from each disaster evacuated and shoved into the remaining ELPs wherever they could. But Atlantis herself withstood every threat, every crisis, eventually bringing them all to their new home, on Novelle.

Novelle. New. New world, new chance to build a new life. 

Shame about dragging all the old crap along with them. Including the politics of a corrupt system that was stifling anything good, as far as Tony could see. 

The newly re-elected Captain of Atlantis rose when called by the Chief Warrant Officer, the officiate for the election process. This was Robert Kinsey’s third term in the office of Captain. Tony didn’t expect this one to be any different than his other terms. Not that any of his rivals for the position would have been much better. They were all much of a muchness: entitled, avaricious, lying assholes, political animals with no empathy, no sense of honor or justice, and absolutely no wish to see any changes to the status quo that would loosen their stranglehold on the politics of the entire colony of Novelle. Tony half thought he could recite the man’s inauguration address before he even began. He was tempted to let himself drift off to sleep… except that might call attention to him, and that was the last thing he wanted to do. 

He had been led to the podium by his father, Anthony DiNozzo Senior, Chief Procurement Officer, told to sit in his designated chair near the back, with the other Grooms, and to keep his mouth shut and behave himself. As if he ever did anything else. Tony didn’t let the man’s terse warnings trouble him. As far as his father was concerned, he was little better than a vegetable, near-catatonic, except that he had the ability to walk, feed and dress himself, and sit on his own. Tony had spent two decades convincing his father he was completely harmless. This was not the right time to blow his cover. Not until he was *sure* he had a way out.

“My fellow Lanteans, Officers and Crew of the great city-ship Atlantis. Thank you for the confidence you have shown me by re-electing me for another term as your Captain…”

Confidence? Yeah, no. Fear, of secrets held that could ruin them? Greed, to share in the power and luxuries of the Officer Elite? Vested interests in the innumerable dirty little deals he had made in back rooms all over the City to buy support? Probably. 

“The time for Change is long past due. As your Captain, I pledge to ensure the safety and prosperity of you all, by maintaining the Charter, and the contracts and treaties that are so vital to our continuing position as the leaders of Novelle…”

The largest area available to assemble the five thousand-or-so members of the Crew, their families, and their invited guests, was outside, on the open South Pier deck. Lucky the weather in this Central Basin of the world-spanning ocean was cooperating today, sunny, bright, warm, not too blustery. 

Crew were all dressed in their black Lantean uniforms for the occasion, the same combination of pants, T-shirts, jackets and vests. Badges sewn on shoulders and sleeves denoted Division and section. The Officer Elite were identified with a Winged Horse badge. Two crossed writing styluses for the Operations Division (OD): upright sword for the Security Force Division (SFD): an odd triangle, open at the bottom, with a circle on top for the Science Division (SD): staff-and-snake for the Medical Division (MD): Two crossed brooms for the Maintenance & Service Division (MSD). 

Devices pinned to collars and chests announced rank and awards won. Probationary trainees got a yellow arm-band to wear, replaced by the appropriate rank pins as they graduated from their apprenticeships. Rank was shown by varying numbers of bars or stars in silver, for team, unit, section or squadron leads, while the Executive Officers and division Chiefs got three gold stars, their Deputies got two, and the Captain alone had four gold stars on his collar. 

School children and family members without crew assignments all sat together with the school units and classes, dressed in their colorful best for the occasion.

Over behind the lowest-ranked MSD staff sat the invited guests from the Provinces, the various mainland and island colony settlements scattered in and around the great Ocean. Atlantis had supplied both large monitors to aid in displaying the podium to those seated too far away, as well as public address speakers to transmit the speeches. Council members and Province Guardian teams, representing the colonist Elpers, wore an eclectic variety of colorful clothing that contrasted vividly with the Crew. 

Listening to the Inauguration Address with more or less degrees of boredom, some of the guests rolled their eyes. It was rare that Elpers were even permitted upon the City decks outside of the Noreast Market Pier, as if they carried some inherent infection, liable to spread to their superiors… and even the most lowly Crew member in the Maintenance & Service Division felt superior to any Elper. After the official ceremonies were completed, there would be a reception and ball in the Central Command Tower fifth floor Ballroom, expected to go all night, from past examples. All were invited to attend, but few Elpers would stay for long. Inauguration Day was a blatant display of the power of the Lanteans, a reminder to the mainland Elpers to know their place. At the bottom of the Novelle hierarchy.

“I further Pledge that our Security Force Division will be expanded in coming months, to regain our domination against the Goa’uld Scourge…”

Oh, really? Who was the guy kidding with that? The SF Division already boasted around a thousand men and women, a fifth of the total population. If he was expanding that number even more, it was in case he needed to quell the growing unrest among the Elpers, or beef up his coast guard squadrons, to try to get a handle on the recent expansion of the massive black market and smuggling trade. Whichever it was, it certainly had nothing to do with the Goa’uld, as real, nasty and insidious as that threat truly was.

With Goa’uld attacks on the mainland continents and islands increasing every year, both in numbers and destructive scale, SFD interventions had been like a single cup of water dashed on a forest fire. Too little and too damn late. The provincial militias, volunteers drawn from among the farmers, fishers, herders, miners, builders and other guilds and common folk, did their best, but they were all too easily overwhelmed. Any call for help to the Lantean SFD was slow in coming, and never without pledges of increased tribute in payment. Once a Goa’uld incursion was detected, it was almost always too late to do anything but fight, anyway. The only truly effective counter was to find and kill them before they could take a host, be it animal or human. Once having gained a land-based body, they would gather in numbers, and attack any prey deemed too weak to fight them off. Better to deal with them before they attacked. And *that* was something you needed Sentinels and Shamans for. Much as the Captain and his Officer Elite hated and tried to ignore that fact.

Tony had to restrain a smirk at that thought… it would reveal too much about his true condition, if anyone should be paying him too much attention. Not dear old Dad, certainly, but his ‘Intended’ was sitting over there with the Brides, a woman he only knew by reputation and personnel files supplied to him by a helpful and worried City. The woman might be expected to be studying this pig-in-a-poke husband she was about to marry. 

But when he cast his hazy-seeming glance over the assembly down on the deck, he caught one set of eyes looking back at him thoughtfully. They were kaleidoscope eyes, wheeling colors gently glimmering… alien eyes, but beautiful, mesmerizing, and sharp with intelligence as they studied him intently. They were set in a pale white face, with a frame of pure white hair. He realized he was exchanging stares with Alpha Shaman Luna Lovegood, of Hogwarts Province. And she obviously was seeing deeper into him than anyone else had since he was eight years old. It should have been disconcerting, maybe even threatening, a risk to his cover… but she smiled faintly, head tilted to one side as she considered him, and nodded, before returning her vague, only mildly interested attention back to the Captain. 

At some point in their space-faring Exodus from the lost home-world, (the details were muddled and incomplete, accurate record keeping not being anyone’s priority during that turbulent period) they encountered another, damaged, ark-ship. It was escaping its own home-world devastation. The Lanteans agreed to accept the new refugees among them, especially when the aliens brought their own supplies with them, and were able to repair one of the ELPs that had developed serious faults, so they could take it over. The two species merged: humans and humanoid ‘Magicals’. Biologically, they were compatible, but merging socially was a bit of an issue. Magicals were much longer lived than humans, but their birth-rate was correspondingly much lower. They were able to manipulate energy and matter in ways that mimicked ‘magic’, to some extent. The main physical difference between humans and Magicals was their eyes… Magical eyes tended to… well, sparkle might be the best description of the wheeling colors in the iris that glittered in the dark, and brightened when a Magical accessed their powers.

Most of the Magicals, all of the so-called pure-blood families from their reconditioned Enviro, now occupied a single province on Novelle, named Hogwarts. So did many of their half-blood offspring, but by no means all. Only the Magicals knew where that unlikely name, ‘Hogwarts’, came from. Tony figured it was derived from their alien language, now mostly used only in their spell-casting. Shaman Luna Lovegood was said to be pure-blood, but her Sentinel, Harry Potter, was half-blood. Together, they were the Guardians of Hogwarts. Potter was a small, compact man, with a shock of unruly black hair, the wind on the South Pier blowing his bangs back to reveal a scar on his forehead. Their Guardian Team was rounded out by tech expert half-blood Hermione Granger, an attractive young woman with bushy brown hair, and vanguard pure-blood Ron Weasley, tall, gangly, with vivid red hair. 

Even Magicals were vulnerable to Goa’uld attack, and needed such human, or half-human, protections as sentinels and shamans provided.

“I assure all of you, that the City is strong. She has stood for countless years and generations, our salvation and our strength, and this will not change. Under my Captaincy, I will see her maintain her power and glory. As she was our bulwark in the Exodus across interstellar space to this new home of Novelle, as she was our protection upon Landing, and in the two hundred seventeen years since, so she will remain…”

That, Tony knew, was wishful thinking on the part of their reaffirmed Captain, if not outright delusion. Atlantis had shared with him a secret… something the Captain and his Officer Elite inner circle no doubt wanted no one else to know… The power cells that fuelled the great City were rapidly running down to total depletion. 

The long Exodus, flying through space, sometimes in hyperspace, more often at sub-light speeds, with Shield in place and life support on maximum, towing twelve massive ELPs, while also providing basic air, water, food and clothing from the Fabrication System (FS), had placed a severe strain on the City. Engines, raw material stores and power cells had all taken the hits, to a far greater extent than the Lantean leadership would ever want to admit. Now, over two hundred years after Landing, the Lanteans were soon going to be faced with the inevitable end of their gravy train… and their formerly unassailable dominance. 

Only in the past generation had measures finally been put in place to limit energy usage in the City’s various non-essential systems. Whole sections of the massive City had been emptied, shut down and locked up. With the Lantean population numbers falling with each year, there was still plenty of room for the five thousand or so men, women and children who were left. Hell, there would have been room for millions, if there were so many humans anywhere. But with the rapidly falling power levels, all of the structures below the water line were vacated, except for some Central Command Tower basement levels, where the main FS facilities were located. The North, Norwest, Souwest and Soueast Piers were ghost towns, abandoned and echoing. The only City structures still occupied were the Central Command Tower itself, where the main bulk of the population lived and worked; the South Pier, claimed by the SFD as their base, two much lower towers for barracks, training facilities and armories, as well as the wide open landing pad deck, as parade grounds and assembly point; and the Noreast Pier, holding the docks and open plazas for the Elper Market, where just a few structures were utilized as warehouses, silos and storage sheds. 

As nearly as Tony could figure, it was sheer greed that continued the worst of the power drain after Landing. Among the City’s main systems, the biggest energy-hogs were the Shield, the star-drive, and, of course, the Fabrication System. Well, the star-drive had been shut down almost immediately and moth-balled for needed maintenance and repairs that never did get to the top of priority lists. The Shield was only raised, on minimum power, for the worst storms, or when a goa’uld Hosting Season attack was imminent. Which left the FS. 

The Matter Fabrication System, more commonly called the FS, had been absolutely essential during the Exodus, to produce food, clothing and other goods necessary for survival, even vital water and oxygen to be pumped to the ELPs, while they fled through inhospitable space. But once Landed, the entire colony should have been able to switch to native food and other resources, and close off the FS as superfluous to their needs. The Elpers had certainly been immediately cut off from all such supplies, and they had always been severely rationed. 

But not the Lanteans. Sure, they no longer needed to create their own oxygen and water, all life support functions were on minimum or switched off altogether, but they had become too dependent upon the City’s galley hatch meals, the Infirmary hatch medicines and medical supplies, and even their daily uniforms, for pity’s sake. Free food, furniture, clothing, weapons, even the super fluffy bedding that came out of the fabrication facility… were not as free as they all once thought, and the true cost was about to come due.

Only recently had FS usage become restricted. A few of the minor hatches remained operational, tightly controlled and monitored, reserved for vital replacement parts for the City, high-tech items, such as scientific and medical instruments, specialty medicines and drugs, and their advanced weaponry. Oh yes, and to supply the Officer Elite with any damn fribble they wanted. With the resources of Novelle, the rest had been declared unnecessary… even if closing them down did force the Lanteans to rely upon the Elpers for their supplies of most goods and food staples. 

The Lantean leadership might tell everyone the power shut-downs and closures were because of repairs required, but Tony knew the truth. In less than a year, perhaps no more than a couple of months, the whole City might be dead in the water, literally, without the power to light up the halls, or operate the transport cabinets. And wouldn’t that be fun, climbing up the seventy-odd floors to the Central Command Tower Operations Deck? He hoped the out-of-shape and aging Kinsey was up to the challenge, along with his crony Exec Officers, of whom Anthony DiNozzo Senior was one. But Tony thought, with an inner gloating smirk, on the whole, probably not. 

Yeah, let the Crew feel the sting of limited resources and rationed usage, for once. Conditions the Elpers were well familiar with, all throughout the Exodus, and even after the Landing. 

During the Exodus, a burgeoning population in all the Enviros severely stressed resources. The hurriedly erected platforms were nowhere near as robust as Atlantis herself. After so much time, generations since the home-world fell, they all began to experience serious fatigue not even the Magicals were able to repair. Two more environmental platforms were lost in the journey, over-taxed life-support systems and deteriorating super-structures resulting in complete system failures. Again, evacuees were forced to shove in with other already over-crowded platforms. But they were lucky to only lose two in this way.

And they were damned lucky to find Novelle when they did.

That much was known to every school child, Lantean and Elper alike.

The seven surviving environmental platforms were dropped around the edges of the Ocean, on the North and South Continents and one on a larger one of the major archipelago islands, while Atlantis herself settled upon the wide blue waves of that world-spanning body of salt-water, in the Central Basin. 

Which should have been their happy ending. Peace, prosperity and security for all, room enough for everyone to spread out and live lives of plenty, as pioneer colonists on this rich and verdant new world.

Yeah, no. It seemed every Eden had its fair share of serpents. It wasn’t just the Goa’uld parasites, native to Novelle, either. The Lanteans had not only brought some evils with them, but had invented whole new ones on their own.

Including the crushingly unequal class structure Tony was staring in the face right now.

Perhaps it was inevitable from the start, that the Lanteans, the Officers and Crew of Atlantis, would assume the top of the hierarchy. After all, the Enviros were little more than refugee camps, subject to over-crowding and totally dependent upon the city-ship for their very existence. Generations of cramped quarters and rationed supplies had built an unfortunate state of learned helplessness and inferiority among the rescued Elpers, while the Crew enjoyed all the advantages of the City, including space, and no hint of limits on their creature comforts. Well, it was easy to justify, when Crew needs were so critical to survival. When they carried such a burden of responsibility for everyone’s lives, what right did anyone have to begrudge them some degree of luxury? 

Like the myths of the Sentinels who once led and protected their Tribes in the misty hunter-gatherer past, skills and abilities vital to basic survival made for natural, and uncontested, leaders. 

Crew were better fed, clothed, educated, trained. It never occurred to anyone, apparently, that the simpler solution was just to move everyone aboard Atlantis for the trip. If it did occur to the Lanteans, they recoiled in horror at the very idea of ‘mixing’ with the displaced refugees. Their main argument against it was that Atlantis was too dangerous for the uninformed to wander its still-unexplored towers and basements. Any new tower, level, lab or room opened could trigger a disaster. The wrong person, touching the wrong button, pulling the wrong lever, perhaps even thinking the wrong thing in a sensitive area, could set off an explosion, cause a weakened or unstable device to overload or ignite long-accumulating fumes, prompt an unknown weapon to misfire… This was all true enough. It still happened, if someone ventured, by accident or design, into forbidden or unexplored areas. 

If the simpler solution occurred to the ELP denizens, they had no leverage, either in arms, economic or political influence, to insist on the move. 

But then, natural attrition and inbreeding caught up with the Lanteans. Even before Landing, they were reluctantly forced to recruit from the Enviros. That recruitment became the only ticket to a better life. If there was a stigma to Elper recruits, even once they were made part of the Crew, well, that seemed natural enough, too. Most Officer and Crew positions were hereditary, the ranks filled with legacy offspring. And this was natural enough, too. The active Atlantis Technology Activation Gene, the ATA, their genetic interface with the City, that conferred the ability to interact with and control her technology, was an inherited trait. 

The problem was, once they landed upon Novelle, and the former inhabitants of the Enviros built independent settlements on dry land, surely that *should have* ended the iron and total political and economic control of the Lanteans. 

But that’s not what happened. 

A new planet held too many dangers and threats in those precarious early years. Atlantis technology could determine edible from toxic plants and animals. The only trained medical personnel were still those in the Atlantis Medical Division. Making textiles, curing leather, producing any number of basic tools, to say nothing of farming, fishing, mining… developing the independent infrastructure and industries to establish and support themselves… All of this was new and unknown territory to the Elper colonists. The only source of information, directions and practical instruction was held by the Atlantis Science Division, in the extensive City Databanks. At least, that was so in the early years, until the various Guilds and Crafts were able to take over, having gained practical experience. Even before the Goa’uld threat became clear to them, animal, and, alarmingly, plant predators attacked the struggling Elper communities. The Atlantis military Security Force Division, extensively trained and adequately armed with advanced armor, equipment and weaponry, were needed for protection, or to assist when natural disasters occurred. After all, only the Lanteans, with their ATA Gene, were able to fly the shuttles, that could span the globe and come to the rescue in under an hour. 

And the price of any such assistance? Was a levy of food and goods to the floating city-ship, and yielding to Lantean political control and oversight.

And knowing all too well how the laws of Supply and Demand could work in their favor, the Lanteans mandated that all Trade must go through them, and the Market they established on the City. Sure, there was a lively black market, smugglers trading among the various settlements, but the only sources of advanced tech or armaments were carefully controlled by the Lanteans. It was a stranglehold on Novelle security, economics, politics, and even legal systems.

Almost as soon as they landed, the Captain and his Officer Elite had insisted upon a written Charter. And desperately dependent upon all the help that only the Lanteans could provide, the leaders of the seven Provinces felt they had no choice but to sign.

So the class structures and hierarchies that began in space were perpetuated on Novelle, and signed into law. Lanteans became overlords of the colony. The Elpers (a term so ingrained it also persisted after Landing) bent under the tax levies and trade restrictions, ever more resentful of the oppression they felt, that no longer held much practical justification. 

Worse yet was the mandatory recruitment of ATA-positive children to Crew. That was written into law, the Fifth Clause to the Novelle Charter, most often referred to as the Gene Mandate.

There was a simple test that was used to identify those rare few who had the active ATA Gene. Holding a life-sign scanner or other piece of Atlantis tech was enough. If it lit up, you had the Gene. Considering how rare, and how vital, an active ATA Gene was, the Lanteans had put the Fifth Clause to the Charter in place, to bring all ATA-positive children to Atlantis, away from their settlements, and their families, whether they willed or not. Any Elper who tested positive was automatically recruited to Crew, and testing was done the first day of school, for everyone. Lanteans wanted to be sure ATA-positives were trained by them, exclusively. Raised to be loyal to the City, not blood family. They also enacted breeding requirement bylaws for the City, for Gene-carriers, to ensure its continuation. 

It was that bylaw that had bit Tony in the ass. Almost literally.

Yeah, he had the Gene. Among other, far less obvious, gifts.

Where his supposed mental deficiency might have released him from his father’s continuing control, made him a nonentity easy to overlook… the Gene made him a valued commodity his father could trade on. So much the better if he had no apparent will of his own.

If it were only yet another forced marriage in his immediate future (this would be the fifth time his father had traded him away for a temporary stud contract, or, no, it was the sixth) maybe he could have gritted his teeth, thought of Atlantis, and bowed to the inevitable. He’d endured worse in the name of personal survival, to protect his mask of helpless imbecility.

But the corruption and depravity he could increasingly detect all around him was… unbearable.

Not all of those projected thoughts and feelings were communicated through the City, although she was not happy with the worsening situation on her decks and in her towers. She was also beginning to fear the consequences when the little power remaining in the energy cells inevitably ran out. She had been able to hoard some back-up battery cells in hidden corners to enable her to continue, but even that wouldn’t last forever. 

As for Tony, he had been feeling the emotions of the humans around him for countless ten-days, months… maybe even years, he thought, with the benefit of hind-sight. 

Because he knew what was happening to him, now. 

He was surfacing… as a Shaman.

Å 

It was just Tony’s luck, to be made part of the Inauguration Celebration to re-affirm the Lantean Captain. Seventeen other couples were joining him and his betrothed on the podium. Dozens of Doctorates were also going to be conferred, along with various medal awards, commendations and promotions.

And among the guests were representatives from the seven Elper Provinces, including their militia Guardian teams, Sentinel-Shaman pairs (if they had them), and political leaders, representatives from their various province and settlement councils. 

But, of course, the Elpers were all in the back, out in the harshest sunlight and the stiffest and chilliest ocean breezes, out there on the open South Pier landing pad deck, just barely out of reach of the damp salt-water spray. 

Hardly honored and respected guests, no matter what the long-winded political speeches claimed. 

A movement caught Tony’s eye, at the back of the crowd… An older gentleman sitting with the Hellmouth delegation, dressed like the rest of his group in the stiff protective leather garments required for the mines, forges, smelting and metal-works. He also sported half-glasses on his nose that revealed his kaleidoscope eyes. The spectacles made him seem more like a scholar than a miner. He pulled a dark wooden wand from under his leather vest, and subtly waved it, with a whisper on his lips. A sheer curtain, almost transparent, floated out of nowhere to surround the entire Elper section, protecting its collection of seated attendees from the wind, and shading them from the sun. His own group, seeming far too young to be here, and surely most of them were barely teenagers, leaned over to tease him for his intervention. Tony could *not* forbear a smirk at the half-blood Magical, who raised one eyebrow, then covertly winked back at him. 

An Inauguration was an unrepentant political grand-stand for the new, or in this case, re-elected Captain. At one time Captain had been a hereditary post, but the Weir family had all died out, leaving a gaping hole at the very top of the Lantean hierarchy. Robert Kinsey had been in command for three terms, so far, and had the full support of all the most hard-line Officers and Crew, as well as the Security Force Division… not surprising, since he kept them all in power. 

Tony hated the man like poison. It was he, as Chief Judge Advocate General (or JAG) at the time, who had refused to investigate his mother’s highly suspicious death. An old crony of Anthony DiNozzo Senior, Kinsey had found no reason to question Senior’s version of the events that led to his mother’s fatal fall from the balcony of their fifty-sixth story family quarters. Not even when her blood alcohol level tested through the roof, and Senior remarried a ten-day later. 

Yeah. Atlantis was *filled* with morally corrupt greedy bastards. 

And speaking of the morally corrupt… sitting on the other side of the podium with the other Brides, was his own intended. Ziva David, Intel Officer, under her father, Eli David, Unit Chief of Intel, the intelligence-gathering unit within the Operations Division. The woman was stunningly beautiful, he had to give her that much… warm olive complexion, raven-black hair flowing around her shoulders, an athletic body that had been trained to within an inch of her life, all her movements swift, balanced, aggressive, lethal. If it were just physical attraction… okay, yeah, he supposed he could do the job she and her father wanted. But then he would have to get… up close and personal with her. And that… that was going to be a problem. 

Even at this distance, he could feel her temper fuming, hear her loud, raging thoughts… 

There should have been someone else, *anyone* else her father could have chosen for her… but none with the coveted ATA Gene. Certainly, no one as easily manipulated, with a Gene rated as high as DiNozzo’s. She barely gave him a glance as she passed the other men of her acquaintance past her review. Her father couldn’t have chosen another Intel officer? Michael, for instance? Ray, even? But no, Ray didn’t have a Gene at all, and Michael’s was watered down to the point he could barely turn on a life sign detector, much less fly one of the shuttles. All indications were his offspring wouldn’t have an active Gene at all. So here she was, stuck with the DiNozzo turnip. But, her father had reminded her, there were definite advantages to the situation. She certainly wouldn’t have to worry about her husband challenging her on any front, or getting in her way. 

In Ziva’s hand was a long, narrow blade, twirling and juggled from deft practiced fingers, a favorite tool of Intel officers, as she glowered at all and sundry. 

It made Tony shudder. *She* made him shudder. There hadn’t been an active ATA Gene in the David family for five generations. It might have been bred out of the line altogether, considering what murderous jerks they all were, even if they had been Crew since before the Exodus. Why they thought buying Tony would change that… 

And ‘buying’ was exactly the right word. Well, maybe ‘renting’ fit even better.

There had never been any love lost between DiNozzo Senior and Junior, but it had become outright hatred after Claire’s death. Young Tony, eight years old at the time, had no defense against his father’s brutality. No one ever lifted a finger to help, or uttered a word in protest, if they knew, or even guessed, what happened behind the DiNozzo closed doors. Tony became a virtual mute in the aftermath of those first tortured months at his father’s nonexistent mercy. Luckily, DiNozzo Senior believed that young Tony’s apparent catatonia and mutism were permanent. That the beatings had worked all too well to quell his son’s rebellion. Tony Senior, the ‘real’ Tony DiNozzo, as he told everyone with a smarmy grin, claimed his son was an imbecile, brain-damaged in the womb by his mother’s alcohol abuse. Which would in no way hamper his ability to pass on his Gene, when the time came. 

Senior had been trolling for the highest bidder on his otherwise worthless son’s procreative abilities every since, capitalizing on his services as soon as the boy became sexually mature. Until he came of age, this took the form of visits from some of Senior’s ‘special’ friends from the Medical Division, to extract live sperm into stasis bottles, rather than more… personal interactions. Senior still paid a minimal lip-service to the laws that protected the underage. No need to risk blatantly antagonizing everyone, after all, and Dr. Mallard, the CMO, occasionally gave him some very hard looks... He was good at bending the laws, skirting right up to the edge of them, and careful not to be caught when he dared to step over them.

Locked alone in his room most of his days, young Tony was left in peace, and unmolested. Senior went about his duties, jockeying for power and influence among the Officer Elite, steadily climbing in the ranks, and entirely forgetting his son’s very existence, until it suited him. His succession of trophy wives ignored the boy totally. Senior might have thought it… odd, that none of those wives were able to produce more children, but infertility and sterility were a growing problem with all of the old Lantean family lines. Young Tony was considered a one-off, in more ways than one… While his mother’s Paddington family line still retained an ATA, the DiNozzos did not. If Senior suspected Claire had been unfaithful, not only to become pregnant at all, but to produce such a strong Gene-carrier, he never mentioned it. He preferred to have that asset under his thumb.

Atlantis herself was young Tony’s constant, and only, companion. She ensured he wasn’t under any kind of surveillance, and this enabled her to provide him a certain freedom. She opened a secret transport cabinet in his private quarters to take him to one of the abandoned sections of the City, where he could run, play, scream… relieve the stress he was under, maintaining the illusion of the protective mask he wore for his father’s benefit. She supplied any and every diversion she could to a lonely and angry boy, who possessed one of the strongest active Genes of all. Sections of her incredibly complex and convoluted database, that no other human had ever seen, were opened to him at his merest request. 

In his aerie cell, Tony had devoured any knowledge Atlantis chose to share with him. History, politics, science… she prioritized some things she felt he needed… for instance, the complicated laws of the Lanteans and the Elpers, as set down in the Novelle Charter. That had been *very* interesting and informative. Useful too, at this moment, when escape and a certain kind of liberty might finally be within reach. While underage, he had been protected only to a point, any sexual activity being illegal. But, assumed to be brain-damaged, he had no rights to self-determination at all, that weren’t permitted by his bastard father, and no recourse, unless he broke his long-standing protective cover. Having the Gene meant that, even after he came of age, even if he were to come out as in full possession of his faculties, the law could now claim certain rights over his body. 

Senior had no problem getting his son declared incompetent, and made his legal ward. The stored sperm was kept in reserve, Senior’s secret nest-egg and retirement plan, while he lived off the proceeds of Tony Junior’s custody. Since marriage contracts could be time-limited, he had sold his son for stud several times, for ‘considerations’, with a substantial bonus if a child resulted, multiplied ten-fold if that child had the Gene. Tony had five children now under the age of ten, and all had his extremely strong expression of the ATA Gene. Since all were the property of the mothers, per the marriage contracts, he had never even met any of his kids.

Yeah, maybe the Davids did have reason to think Tony could give their next generation a leg up. 

It broke his heart, that he had never met any of his kids face-to-face, never had a chance to hold one of them. Abby, Kate, Tim, Jimmy and baby Ellie. The City kept him up to date on their lives, showing him surveillance footage of them, sent him reports from their classes and care-givers… but oh, how he yearned to hold them in his arms. Even if any reaction on his part would betray his secrets to all. He would willingly give up his masks, and any chance he had to escape, if he could just… But it had never been an option, in any case. And right now, seated on the podium in full view of the entire Lantean population, he didn’t dare even try to catch a glimpse of any of them. He wouldn’t be able to bear it. At least they had one parent each who loved and cared for them. Their mothers, and their mothers’ families, loved and doted on his kids, even if they had forgot, or deliberately ignored, his part in their conception. DiNozzo Senior never went anywhere near them, thank you Higher Powers. 

Would the Davids be as loving? Somehow, Tony doubted it. Ziva didn’t seem to have feelings for anyone but her father, and Eli didn’t raise kids, he forged weapons.

While waiting between marriage contracts, Senior eventually hit upon a new profit-making opportunity for his dead-weight son… Tony thought he should probably feel lucky it hadn’t occurred to Senior sooner. But some months ago, one man paid for ‘exclusive use’ of the service Senior offered. Leroy Jethro Gibbs, a Squadron Commander in the Atlantis military Security Force Division, began nightly visits to DiNozzo Junior’s bedchamber. 

It was in his desperate need for escape that Tony found he could shut off his emotions, his budding empathy, and disassociate himself from his body. 

That first night with Gibbs was the same night he, by accident, discovered the Spirit Plane. His visits there had been sporadic ever since, as he struggled to find a way to control the ability, and pass back and forth at will. 

It was his only refuge whenever That Man entered his room… 

But how long, really, would he be able to survive this near-intolerable life? Tony could only bide his time, waiting for the slightest opportunity to escape his father’s clutches. He could feel it right now, just out of reach…

How tragic that his chance might be too late to save him from being dumped straight into the hands of the David family, arguably even more corrupt than his own father. Intel Unit Chief Eli David sat just off to one side, gloating madly as he contemplated his daughter’s coming nuptials. The one impediment to his rise to the Officer Elite was possession of the Gene, even if only in a grandchild he could control. And just behind Eli David sat LJ Gibbs, glowering at all and sundry, less than an hour away from losing his favorite toy… unless, of course, Gibbs could work a continuation of his ‘arrangement’ with the Davids. After all, all they really wanted Tony for was his stud services. 

But no, that deadline might be more than an hour away, if Captain Kinsey was so enamored of the sound of his own voice that he went over his allotted speech time.

Å 

There was one loop-hole in the legal trap Tony was in, that Atlantis was careful to reveal to him. And another section of her extensive library she opened to him... All that was known about shamans. 

There had been shamans among the human race since the beginning, it appeared, and in every race, in every time, not unlike their sentinel partners. Losing their homes and traversing space to a new world hadn’t altered that. Even the Magicals had rumors of shamans among them (if not sentinels), their abilities said to be similar to, but definitely separate from, their ‘magic’. They might be called different things, there were different definitions, even different skills taught and functions served, depending upon the Tribe. But all shared the ability to transcend the physical plane, to enter the heightened reality of another existence. The Spirit Plane. Also going by many names: Dream Time, Ascended Realm, Shadow Lands, Blue Jungle. Shamans lurked in the shadows, even when the societies around them felt they were too advanced, too civilized, to believe in fairy tales of healing powers, evil spirits, Dream Walks and Spirit Guides. Shamans descended to the level of myth, just as sentinels did: those who claimed such status were disbelieved and ridiculed, and the Old Ways were replaced, discarded or lost. The *potential* to gain the training of a shaman and access the Spirit Plane was present in every human, perhaps in every Magical too. Still there, just suppressed, awaiting the proper set of circumstances, and the necessary triggers.

After the Landing, humans once again found themselves in a battle to survive, in the most elemental and primitive way, on a world that was new and unknown and dangerous. Atlantis carried the technology well able to determine what flora and fauna was safe, edible, benign, even beneficial as food or medicines. Likewise, the same tech could warn of toxicity. Even the most rudimentary scanners could easily warn of most approaching predators. But the Lanteans, even with all of their technology, were stretched thin, and reluctant to help as much as they were able, without the offer of sufficient recompense of some kind…

In this crisis, humanity was thrown back into the life-styles of their ‘primitive’ distant ancestors, hunting parties following game herds and harvest seasons, fleeing drought, flood, fire and predators. The landed Enviros offered some protection, but not enough, and not for long. The disparate Elper Tribes saw the archetypes of their hunter-gatherer past rise again. 

First, the Sentinels manifested, those with the genetic predisposition toward enhanced and extreme senses. They could smell disease and toxicity in plants and animals, and determine what was edible. They could feel a change in the weather, or the shifting in the ground, that might presage storms or earthquakes. On the hunt, they could track any animal, no matter how light or soft-footed, over stone. They could hear an enemy or predator on the darkest night. But, because those very extreme senses could spike, over-whelm and sink a Sentinel, overloading a too-acute neural net, they needed a partner. Someone who could shield them, guide them, bring them back from the dangerous trance-like ‘zone’, which left them all too vulnerable. 

So second, came the guides. No special inheritance was required, merely enough sensitivity to be able to work together and gain the trust of their sentinel partner. In some cases, even animals had filled the role… loyal dogs, trained hunting hawks or alert and spirited horses. Of course, in the case of the strongest sentinels, something more was needed… and so the Shamans began to surface, whose advanced training, empathy and access to the Spirit Realm enabled them to fully connect with, shield and enhance their Sentinel partner. Strongest of all were the Bonded Pairs, greater than the sum of their parts. 

And then the first Goa’uld appeared.

They were an indigenous life form to Novelle, a kind of sea-snake with a strange life-cycle. 

Although spawned and hatched in fresh-water sources, their larval forms require the freedom of open salt water to develop, over a period of ten years. But at maturity, at Hosting Season, they are driven to the shores, to attempt to enter the bodies of large land-based animals. They enter through mouths or the backs of necks, attaching to the brain stems, to control their hosts, and live out the remainder of their life-cycle, gain in strength and size, eventually to seek out mates for spawning. The mating urge is spurred by a pheromone lure put out by one of the very rare queens at Spawning Season. She waits, in her sea-snake form, host body abandoned and dead, her own natural form swelled hugely by an internal egg-sack, in any fresh-water source, a river, stream or lake with outlets to the sea. Male drones congregate around her, detach violently from their own dying hosts, to return to the water and battle to the death for the right to fertilize the queen’s eggs. These are then deposited by the thousands in quiet eddies, tangled roots or pebble nests. Then the Goa’uld male drones, their purpose swerved, themselves die. The exhausted queen lingers in the fresh water for the next ten-day, feeding on dead drones and former hosts, until her eggs begin to hatch… and then she feasts on her own young not swift or clever enough to escape her, until she is strong enough to return to the sea. Surviving hatchling larvae also make their ways to the salt-water sea, to begin the cycle anew. 

While within the host creature, they are serious and deadly predators, aggressive, stronger, quicker, more resilient, faster to heal. But these enhancements increase host metabolism to an extreme degree, driving them with a ravenous hunger, packing in large numbers and attacking any perceived prey to feed with voracious appetites. But the goa’uld parasites are limited beings, only as intelligent as their host allows, only a little more capable than their host’s own innate physical limitations. They do possess a race memory from their spawning queen, but she too is limited by the experience and instincts of the hosts she has taken. 

It was all too soon after Landing that the first Goa’uld queen discovered she vastly preferred the colonists as hosts, over any other life-forms. Queens pass this preference to their offspring, more and more of the parasites pre-disposed to claim only human or Magical hosts. Such hosts offer humanoid intelligence, and, to some extent, humanoid drives. Food, shelter, mates, power… that make them an even more deadly enemy. The males also found that increased intelligence allowed them to override the breeding urge… making the occupation of their hosts far longer than one season or mating cycle. Some of the more dominant Goa’uld are able to collect and control armies of hosts. More than once these have raided an outlying community, razing it to the ground, killing all within to take over the resources for themselves, or keeping just a few captives as slaves, or forcing them to shore-line hosting-grounds for implantation, to join their ranks. 

There are ways to save a host after they are taken over, but it is difficult, and when that host is trying to kill or eat you, well… it is not always possible to rescue an infected person, except with the mercy of a quick death.

Even Atlantis herself is not immune to Goa’uld incursions. Sitting on the Ocean above the Central Basin, at certain times of the year the Goa’uld swarm around the City, seeking a way in, or an unwary Lantean to infest. Clearly, they know, even before taking a Lantean host, that the City is their single greatest chance at total domination of the planet.

And there is often no telling who is a host until it is far too late for their victims. The parasites have access to a host’s memories, after all. They can mimic their personalities, to some degree, for limited periods. They are fully capable of jumping from one host to the next, leaving a dead husk behind, if they are discovered or seek a more advantageous host.

There are certain physical tells, however: a host’s vocalization changes, to an odd and distinctive echoing bifurcated timbre. And their eyes, animal, human or Magical, suddenly flare with a sputtering yellow-tinged electrical charge, glowing brightly, even beyond Magical sparkle. Both these tells only happen when the creature within fails to suppress their volatile emotions. When angry, fearful, or excited, beyond their ability to control and hide their own reactions, their tells will out. Otherwise, they can pass unnoticed by their prey. 

Unless, of course, you are a Sentinel, and can hear them shifting within the host body, or smell the unique metallic odour their hosts give off. Or you are a Shaman, and can sense, both the Goa’uld’s alien arrogance and insatiability, and the subjugated host’s own stifled mental screams of torment.

And, so far, the only successful methods for freeing a host are those that require a Shaman, to force the invading parasite to sleep, kill them, or convince them to exit without doing fatal damage to their host.

It seems as if Sentinels are born with the ‘Protect the Tribe’ mandate, along with a predisposition to the genetic advantage of enhanced senses. Even before they manifest, they are driven to roles of protection within the community. It is not known what influences might bring a latent Sentinel to fully manifest, although trauma, direct threats to their families, Tribes or themselves, are certainly known factors. 

As for the more mysterious and equally rare Shamans… 

There are certain requirements demanded of a shaman, even of those with the potential to walk that difficult path. It isn’t a requirement of blood or genetic inheritance, as with the ATA Gene or the sentinel chromosome complex, but of temperament, experience and training. Tony had studied those requirements carefully, and found he qualified. At any rate, there was no reason to think he *didn’t* qualify. He had read up on all the knowledge and skills areas required, everything Atlantis had made available to him, had practiced certain techniques diligently, had dedicated himself to the path of the shaman. But anyone can study herbs, medicines, healing… anyone can learn the principals of meditation, even if not everyone is capable of the necessary focus and control. 

But these skills, valued as they are, don’t make you a shaman. No. From all Tony could tell, two things were necessary to fully surface. 

The final step, the one he had yet to achieve, was the ability to consciously control his entry to the Spirit World, domain of shamans. He had been there by accident a number of times, in extreme circumstances, but so far couldn’t control it.

The first and most critical requirement, he believed he had already taken. You have to survive your ‘Rite of Passage’. Some crisis must take you to the edge, of life, health, sanity, and then push you, to ‘cross over’, and then return. He was certain his rite of passage had been taken when he was eight… surviving the first night his father had tried, and Tony believed succeeded, in killing him, just like his mother. Beaten until the furious and terrified flailing of the child stilled, his screams quieted into sobs and then silence, finally left for dead, alone, on the floor of his room… young Tony had dreamed… 

He had gone to another place… dim blue shadows of the real Atlantis, but on another level of reality. And there the wet-seeming lick of a coyote pup had roused him. He had sat up, had been comforted by shadows and mists of other people… and had been asked if he was ready to ‘move on’. Maybe he had been too young to know any better, or unprepared for what it really meant to refuse… but come back he did.

He might have regretted that decision in the years that followed… there had been times when the pain, the anger, the betrayal had been just short of too much… but he always felt he had unfinished business. His mother’s ghost cried out for justice. His own anger demanded vengeance. 

But more than that… he could hear Atlantis calling to him. Hers was another lonely, angry, wounded soul, desperate for escape, for freedom, for justice. 

He had returned, and remained, for her. 

Å


	2. Chapter 2: "DiNozzo is coming with us."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Province names are in-jokes: ‘Stargate Commune’ instead of Stargate Command for the *‘Stargate SG-1’* crowd (SGC is the name of their fictional base under the real but now defunct NORAD base at Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs, Colorado); ‘Cascade’ for *‘The Sentinel’* characters (name of the fictional city where Jim Ellison is a police detective); ‘Hogwarts’ for the *‘Harry Potter’* characters (name of the British school for magic that is the main setting); ‘Hellmouth’ for the Buffy-Verse characters (there’s a hell-mouth under the Sunnydale high school that causes most of the demon/vampire action in the series); ‘Foro Boario Italia’ is Italian for ‘cow pasture of Italy’, a *‘Criminal Minds’* joke, as the initials are FBI; ‘Llanuras de los Angeles’ is Spanish for ‘plains of the Angels’, an excuse to call it LA, where *‘Numb3rs’* and *‘NCIS: LA’* are both set; and John and Rodney, locked out of their rightful Atlantis home with others in the *‘Stargate Atlantis’* cast, would of course become rebel pirates in ‘Smuggler’s Reach’.

Å 

Jack O’Neill, Alpha Sentinel of the Province of Stargate Commune, more often called the SGC, winced and shifted in his chair. His ass was definitely going numb.

Daniel’s hand patted at his thigh, and a sentinel-soft “Shh, be still,” was whispered. 

“Why?” Jack whined. Yeah, it was a whine, worthy of any two-year-old of his acquaintance. “You’re not actually listening to any of this guy’s drivel, are you? He’s a damn politician! You can tell he’s lying, because his damn mouth is open.”

Dr. Daniel Jackson, Alpha Shaman of the SGC, sent him a sharp warning glance, dark eyebrows bobbing expressively in a language all their own. He was a good-looking guy, his bond-mate. Oh, who the hell was he kidding? His Danny was gorgeous. Smart, brave, with integrity to burn, brilliant blue eyes, cinnamon colored hair that bleached out blonde in the sun after a long outdoors dig, impressive shoulders and arms built from moving rocks, climbing cliffs, wielding shovels and sieves at said digs. But Jack’s appreciation didn’t blind him to how damned *annoying* Danny could be. He held himself, and Jack, damn it, to a higher standard of behavior. Which was good, Jack supposed… but still. Annoying. And behaving well in public, in *this* public, was his current cross to bear.

On Danny’s far side, Samantha Carter leaned forward to shoot him a sly grin. If his Shaman bond-mate didn’t appreciate him, at least his Guardian Team tech did. 

Blonde, beautiful, bright blue eyes of her own hiding a fierce intelligence, and a way with technology and all that science crap that rivaled any of the Lantean scientists, Carter was definitely one of a kind. Her father was a Lantean who had retired from the SFD to the mainland, but had used his old contacts and favors owed on the City to make arrangements for his gifted daughter to spend some time there, taking classes with the Science Division. She had won a PhD under Dr. M. Rodney McKay himself, but felt alienated enough by the Lantean crowd to come home when she was done. 

Carter struggled from time to time with a rather inconvenient crush on her team lead, him, but they’d made their peace after Daniel joined them, and settled into a sibling-like relationship. Well, maybe more like uncle and niece, since he had ten years or more on her, but she seemed to like older guys. She certainly had commented appreciatively on his silver-fox hair and warm brown eyes a time or two, even knowing his sentinel ears would pick it up… and practically cooed over his tall, lean, militia-trained form with other females around the SGC militia barracks. He’d be happier if she found a mate of her own to love, if he didn’t hate like poison all the men she showed any interest in. But maybe that was just sentinel territoriality speaking. He hoped it was that, and not dog-in-the-manger pettiness. 

Anyway, what was his point? Oh yeah, she was sympathizing with his boredom, where Danny… wasn’t. She knew he hated these command performances on Atlantis. She might believe it was mostly down to just the political crap, the entitled arrogance of their Lantean ‘overlords’ that, admittedly, really drove him up the damn wall. But it wasn’t just that.

Nor was it the snooty sneering of those Science Division wonks from the history and anthropology sections, all aimed at his supposedly-oblivious partner. They had laughed at Daniel’s less-than-popular theories and all but chased him right off the City, to pursue his researches on his own. No, it wasn’t that either. Although that didn’t help any.

It wasn’t much help, either, that Jack still blamed the negligence of the Security Force Division for the tragic death of his son in a goa’uld attack, and the subsequent collapse of his family under the weight of guilt and grief. Because it had been Jack, facing his goa’uld-possessed son, eyes flashing in tell-tale, prepared to attack his mother and little sister, that forced Jack to take a shot… on his beloved son. He had aimed to wound, but the boy had toppled off a cliff into the sea… his body had never been recovered. That was the event that had pushed Jack into his Sentinel senses. None of it would have happened if the damned SFs had busted their butts to get there quicker…

But no. All that, he could swallow and force down for the sake of his civic responsibilities to represent Stargate Commune at this dog-and-pony show.

But Jack had a secret, one he had kept to himself, his immediate family and a very *small* group of his most *trusted* friends, since he was six years old. Even after he manifested at a sentinel, he had decided not to brag it around… But his secret made it just a little on the hard side to keep his cool whenever he had to visit the City. 

Mostly, because she kept trying to talk to him.

Jack had the Atlantis ATA Interface Gene. It was pretty damn strong, too, since there were few places on the whole damn planet he could go and not hear her whispering in his head. But when he was actually on her decks?

She cried out to him. Actually cried! And when he had to leave again? It became a wail of protest that almost put him on his dodgy getting-too-damn-old knees.

So yeah, these visits to Atlantis made him cranky. Very.

“At least that creepy Giles guy put up an umbrella so we don’t all get sun-stroke out here,” Jack grumbled.

That drew him a reproving frown from Daniel, distracting him from the podium. Good. Jack knew calling a half-Magical ‘creepy’ was bordering on prejudice, but Jack was stubborn in his biases, and far more interested in getting Daniel’s goat than practicing diplomacy of any kind. Not that he actually felt any antipathy for half-Magicals… his Team vanguard, Teal’c of Chulak, was one after all, and Jack loved the guy like a brother. Teal’c had been left behind in Cheyenne to ‘hold the fort’, much to his own disgruntlement, while the rest of the Guardian Team was here, watching the back of the SGC Chief Elder, Councilor George Hammond. 

George was pretending he hadn’t heard Jack’s comments, but the tightening of his lips betrayed his amusement, even as he stared straight ahead at the podium.

Daniel glowered at Jack, and continuing in that sub-vocal sentinel-soft undertone sniped, “You better not be referring to all those kids on Giles’ Guardian team, Jack.”

Well, no, not until Daniel mentioned it, anyway… but yeah, Rupert Giles, tall, be-spectacled, grey-haired, with a scholar’s stooped shoulders, their Guardian Team tech, was the only legal adult on the team, practically the only adult in the Hellmouth Province leadership, and that was a crying shame. Not that Jack thought anything hinky was going on there… he had absolutely *no* doubt that Alpha Sentinel Buffy Summers would whip that guy’s ass if he even *thought* about trying something on, half-Magical or no. But the situation that had caused that too-young kid to manifest in the first place was a disgrace and a dishonor to all concerned… particularly the Lanteans, who had let Hellmouth twist slowly in the wind when they needed help the most. From the cold, disdainful and furious eyes of the rest of the Hellmouth delegation as they stared up at the old-new Captain being sworn in, the kids were carrying a grudge. Jack did not blame them one little bit.

Catching the whirling kaleidoscope eyes of Alpha Shaman Willow Rosenberg, Jack sent her a wink and a grin. The red-headed half-blood Magical blushed an adorable red to match her hair color, and tried to hide an answering, and very shy, smile. The last member of the Hellmouth Guardian Team, vanguard Xander Harris, noticed the reaction, and sent Jack an over-protective big-brother scowl. Jack could only smirk at that. He knew that the Harris kid was also hiding a hidden ATA Gene, and, unlike Jack, unless he manifested as a sentinel, Harris could still be dragooned onto the Lantean crew. Not that Jack would *ever* betray *anyone* that way. And the kid knew that, too, because he folded his arms across his chest and lifted a stubborn chin in defiance. At his side, the only other adult with them, Buffy’s mother and Hellmouth Elder, Councilor Joyce Summers, glanced at Jack and merely shook her head in exasperation. Yeah, baiting the Hellmouth delegation wasn’t really any fun. It was too damn easy.

Then Jack sighed. Loudly. Bored past endurance.

“Jack!” Daniel snapped.

“Oh, what? For crying out loud, Daniel, what are you paying attention to that guy for?”

“I’m not paying attention to him, Jack.”

That caught the sentinel up short. “Then what?”

Daniel glanced over Jack’s shoulder to the delegation from Cascade Province. Jack, twisting, caught the nod the Alpha Shaman Prime sent his bonded. The Alpha Sentinel Prime, Jim Ellison, frowned at his own partner, his shrug a demand for explanations.

“What? So, but, therefore?” Jack demanded. Not being especially careful with his impatient tone or volume, all of the sentinels in the Elper stands turned their attention Daniel’s way.

“You can’t feel it?” Daniel whispered, his own volume enough to clue in the other sentinels. And Jack knew better than to disregard him this time, because three vertical lines had appeared over the bridge of his nose, bracketed by those super-serious eyebrows.

“Feel what?”

“There’s a shaman surfacing.”

“What? Here? In this crowd? You’ve got to be kidding me! But it’s just us Elpers and the Lanteans! And I’d think all of the Elpers here who were going to surface already have.”

“Yes. Exactly.”

“Danny?”

And then he felt the excited expectation all around him… the City, waiting for something she wanted, very much.

A Lantean, surfacing as a Shaman?

Hunh.

“So… who is it?”

Å 

Sentinel Jim Ellison was asking the same thing of his own bonded, the Alpha Shaman Prime of Novelle, Blair Sandburg. They had come alone, reluctantly, while all their councilors and the rest of their Guardian Team remained home in Cascade, scorning to join in the blatant political circus on the City. Jim had lost the coin-toss for who would have to come and represent their Province. Blair had lost by proxy, since there was no separating the bonded pair. Not after all their years together.

Like most sentinels, Jim had been in the militia even before he manifested, his ‘serve and protect’ instinct stronger than most. He had taken particular pride in honing his tall, well-proportioned body to be strong, agile, fast. It was the best way to protect what was his. And at the top of that list was his bond-mate. Blair might look like a cuddly teddy-bear in human form, a little under average height, long curly dark hair, vivid blue eyes, a bleeding heart just oozing cuddly vibes… but Jim knew better. His shaman was a damn trouble magnet. The words ‘courage’ or ‘cowardice’ simply didn’t apply to Blair, because the kid just didn’t see any situation in those terms. All he saw was a need to be addressed, soonest, and he went ahead and addressed it. Often without giving Jim any kind of a head’s up that they were about to plow straight into the worst mess imaginable. It was no wonder his guide had formed a bond with the strongest sentinel on the planet, its Prime… it was all Jim could do to keep his bond-mate alive and well at the best of times. 

“Not sure who it is,” Blair whispered, although he was well aware all of the sentinels could hear him, and were listening closely. “There’s something blocking… no, he’s hiding, somehow. He’s back with the Grooms.”

Jim studied the collection of eighteen young men. He could smell the heady emotions wafting around each one, see the dilated eyes, blushes, or paling skin that telegraphed their attitudes, just as his partner could sense the same emotions spilling into their auras. Half a dozen of them were excited, nervous and impatient, their matches made out of love, or at least a heavy dose of lust. Another half dozen were speculative, not necessarily unhappy about their situations as they studied their intended brides, anticipation mounting. A few, hiding their preference for mates of their own sex, were indifferent to their coming nuptials, but resigned to doing their duty by family and Crew. Then there were one or two terrified of their wedding night, young virgins thrust into this by Lantean law and family contracts. 

Which left one who loathed and despised all those around him, desperate for any escape that might present…

But which one was he, lost in the crowd?

Blair gave a little gasp, and whispered, “There. See him? The coyote.”

Jim frowned. A canine shape, faint and ghostly in the daylight, long rangy legs, a ragged-looking pelt of greys and browns. A tail wagging, tongue lolling out to one side of a snout full of sharp predator teeth… The smoky, phantom figure would only be visible to sentinels, shamans and Magicals. Only one person on the podium gave him a second glance.

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me… Isn’t that the DiNozzo kid? He’s supposed to be practically brain-dead!”

Blair grinned. “Or, like a coyote, maybe he’s just *real* good at protective coloration.” 

Å 

Alpha Sentinel John Sheppard kept his partner caught up. The rest of his team, Sentinel Ronon Dex and half-Magical Shaman Teyla Emmagan, were on duty on their ship, leading the crew of the *Puddle Jumper*, docked on the Market Pier and awaiting them, just in case they needed a ‘quick getaway’. Doing a bit of commentary for Rodney kept John’s focus and attention off the City. 

He knew he wasn’t the only Elper who had managed to escape the ATA Testing and therefore also the clutches of the damned Lanteans, until he could manifest as sentinel… but he figured he might just be one of the strongest Gene carriers, on or off the City. He actually had a list of Elpers who were hiding the fact they had the Gene, strong enough to fly the vehicles the Lanteans called shuttles… hunh, pretty bland title for a craft shaped like a rounded-off brick, whether it could fly or not… a list he kept for a certain project he and his bonded were working on, in secret. John knew the SGC Alpha Sentinel was another like him… super-powered hidden Gene and all. The few times the Guardian Teams had assembled together for whatever reason, he had seen the older sentinel wince and shrug his shoulders, as if listening to another voice… the same one John heard, waking and sleeping. There were a few other Elpers he also suspected heard her voice, which required the stronger Genes, the ATA-As and -Bs. For them, she was, after all, rather hard to ignore. She was in so much *pain*, growing worse by the day.

Now, John wondered if part of that was actually coming from the DiNozzo kid. He grimaced from another wave of expectant emotion, rubbing one hand through his spiky black hair, causing even more cow-licks and clumps to scatter in disarray. 

His bonded, Alpha Shaman Dr. Meredith Rodney McKay, could only snort, having caught a wisp of John’s thoughts. “Dream on, Sheppard. According to rumor, the guy was brain-damaged by a beating from his father when he was a kid. DiNozzo Senior tried to claim the damage was done in the womb because of his wife’s drinking… but the med techs all said the evidence of long-term physical abuse was pretty damn horrific.”

“So… why *couldn’t* she be reflecting his pain?”

“There’s not supposed to be enough left in the kid’s head to feel anything, that’s why.”

“Yeah, no, not buying that. Look at him… he’s as bored as we all are at this farce.”

Rodney looked around him, trying to judge for himself. He was not a man to take anything on faith, on another’s word, or without sufficient evidence. He was stubborn that way. 

But then, Dr. Meredith Rodney McKay was in a unique situation. Born as Lantean, raised, trained and accredited with three advanced science degrees before he was even of legal age, rising to become the Chief Science Officer, he had then been one of the very *very* few Lanteans to ever present as either a Sentinel or a Shaman. 

He had already been frustrated beyond endurance by the obtuse ignorance of the Officer Elite, who refused him the reasonable request of resources necessary to keep the City afloat, while they and their privileged cronies seemed indulged in every way. He had been enraged by the rampant corruption all around him, the unfairness, the bigotry against his smartest colleagues just because they had been born Elpers, albeit Elpers with the Gene… but he felt powerless to do anything about any of it. But then, he hadn’t know the half of it, the appalling levels of arrogance, greed, deceit, criminality, all around him, festering like gangrene and poisoning his City. 

And then, five years ago, *someone* had slipped a citrus-filled lemon into his dinner one night. The anaphylactic shock he experienced from his extreme allergy to citrus, almost killed him… or maybe it was more than *almost*.

So when he first entered the Spirit Plane, and felt the pull to his Sentinel bond-mate, following his Polar Bear spirit guide to John’s Osprey, he made the only choice possible. 

He abandoned the luxury, technology, security and advantages of Atlantis, escaped the corruption of small minds and diseased souls, not to mention whoever the hell had tried to murder him, left it all behind for the precarious but thrilling and rewarding life with his sentinel, sailing the waters of the Carib Chain.

The Carib Chain was lumped together as a Province of its own, archipelagoes of numberless islands, large and small, trailing from the ends of continental mountain ranges, or thrust up in volcanic atolls from rifts in the sea floor, dangling in crescents and splayed all across the world-spanning Ocean. Not one chain, but many, and more commonly known collectively as Smuggler’s Reach. Only a relatively small number were inhabited, of course. And, wouldn’t you just know, his dare-devil rebel sentinel made a lucrative living as the captain of the smuggler’s ship *Puddle Jumper*, dodging the patrols of the relentless Security Force Division coast guard squadron. 

Rodney felt like he had won the lottery with this man. He himself was unprepossessing in the extreme, average height, thinning dark hair, unremarkable blue eyes, his ATA-gene rated no more than ATA-C, a medium strength, just high enough to fly a shuttle, were he so inclined. His body had a middle that had always been soft, his time and energies too bound up in his studies and responsibilities to care about his fitness level. As far as he was concerned, his body was nothing more than a transport vehicle for his big brain. 

But militia-trained John Sheppard wasn’t just a handsome and awesome-looking man, he was beautiful. That thick shock of black hair was a bit ridiculous, granted, all sticky-up and unruly, but those hazel green eyes were stunning, his studied slouches disarming to the uninitiated, and that twisted smirk of his… made Rodney’s insides melt. 

Also not at all surprising, his mate possessed a Gene far stronger than his own, at *least* an ATA-A, tying them both to the City. Luckily, she liked John enough to give him advance warning of every coast guard vessel position on sea, or shuttle navigation path in the air. Using Lantean contacts who could be blackmailed or bought, John had gained access to all sorts of highly restricted and valuable contraband, which enabled Rodney, with all of his insider skills, to maintain links to Atlantis, and hack into all of her considerable resources. 

He and John made a hell of a team. 

Trying his best to be subtle about it, Rodney tried to assess DiNozzo Junior. 

Even before he’d surfaced as a shaman, he’d heard a lot of gossip and rumors about the DiNozzos… Most said the death of Senior’s wife wasn’t the accident that the Lantean Officer Elite claimed it was. It was also whispered that Senior had dirt on all the right people to get to his current rank of Chief Procurement Officer. Yeah, ‘procurement’? A dissenting opinion held that it wasn’t threats he used to get ahead, but the promise of pandering to the vices of choice for the Officer cadre. Illicit drugs, alcohol, Elper girls or boys… it was said he could provide whatever pleasure or indulgence you desired, no matter how illegal or morally repugnant… for a price. That price would be a favor called in at some point, or support in whatever sleazy scheme the man had going. No wonder everyone in power looked the other way, and shelved any reports of murder and abuse. 

Rodney’s fingers twitched, itching to get to his laptop to do a bit more investigation, trolling through the City database. Shaman he might be, but he relied far more heavily on facts and figures, trusting to math and physics more than the spirits, especially when lives were on the line. Even after years, he didn’t entirely trust himself where his Shaman abilities were concerned.

John sent him a sideways wink, and caught his hand. Somehow, John’s approval and unconditional support always made him feel better. Taking a deep breath, Rodney centered himself and *reached*, as Blair had taught him… 

He could feel the other shamans in the ‘guest’ stands doing the same. And smoky, blue-tinged animals began to collect and focus on the almost-corporeal coyote, invisible to any un-gifted humans.

Daniel Jackson’s crow cawed loudly enough to make the sentinels all wince, as it launched into the air. Rodney’s white bear ambled up behind the dais, raising on his hind legs and stalking two-legged until he could fall forward with his front paws on the podium. Blair Sandburg’s wolf knocked shoulders with the coyote. Luna Lovegood’s hare bounded around Willow Rosenberg’s doe, and Spencer Reid’s owl circled around Daniel’s crow, both birds coming to roost on the top of the podium canopy, only to duck their heads upside down to stare at the pretty young man sitting among the Grooms. There were other shamans among the Novelle colonists, but only the six of them were Alpha-level in their abilities. 

Unless, of course, DiNozzo Junior joined them. It would make sense, if John was right about the kid. From his mate’s reactions, Rodney suspected the kid’s Gene might be one of those super-charged ATA-A ones, like John and O’Neill’s. Which gave Rodney flashes of jealousy, and even he realized they were stupid, knee-jerk reactions, unworthy of him. He was a grown-ass man with a sentinel mate, a genius mind, and everything he could possibly want in life.

Å 

Alpha Shaman Dr. Spencer Reid closed his eyes tightly, to see through his owl’s eyes. They showed him an attractive young man, strangely athletic and healthy-looking for someone supposed to be brain-dead. Spencer was familiar with most forms of mental illness or damage, having studied his mother’s plight and similar debilitating mental conditions. This young man displayed none of the common markers. None of his muscles had atrophied from inactivity. No facial ticks or twitches from long-term or over-medication, either. Which leant credence to Blair’s assumption that the young man was hiding.

After Spencer had been tested for the Gene as a child, he was found to have a moderately strong one, rated ATA-B. Therefore, he was dragged, screaming, from his mother’s side at the tender age of six. He had spent the next ten years on Atlantis, being trained as part of their Science Division. He had hated every moment he was forced to spend among the Lanteans… learning, taking every advantage of the education they were giving him, that he soaked up like a sponge… that was okay. What else was he going to do, when they wouldn’t let him go home? And the City was fine, she commiserated with the desperately unhappy young Spencer. He was miserable at his mother’s loss, and neglected by the dorm monitors, who were supposed to be caring for the Gene Orphans, as they were called. What was worse, young Spencer was the favorite prey of the bullies among the Crew children, who resented, ostracized, and, if they thought they could get away with it, attacked the ‘damn Elpers’.

So the day he surfaced as a Shaman, three years ago, was one of the happiest of his life. The timing couldn’t have been better, either, since it had been all too close to his reaching age of majority… when the Lantean bylaws would have required a Gene-carrier to marry. But surfacing set him free, to be who he wanted to be, go where he wanted, needed to be. To the side of his bond-mate.

The Province of *Foro Boario Italia* derived its name from a long dead language of the lost home-world, meaning, as best as anyone could tell, cow pasture. But the collection of communities spread across the rolling hills of the eastern spur of the southern continent were more commonly known as Pastureland. Spencer arrived just in time, too, to help his mate stave off one of the worst Goa’uld attacks since Sateda fell.

Spencer had been little more than a teenager at the time. Barely of age after his shaman training period was completed, being ushered around by the Alpha Shaman and Sentinel Primes to see if he had a sentinel match. Taller than most, on the extreme side of ‘thin’, with unruly chestnut hair and soft brown eyes, looking even younger and less healthy than he was, Spencer had never felt he made a good impression on people. But the moment their ship docked in Pastureland, at the capital of DeeCee, all he could see was the imposing man waiting for them: sentinel Aaron Hotchner, leader of their militia. Pale stern face, black hair, intense dark eyes, a ramrod straight bearing, he was all Spencer could have dreamed of, but never imagined he could win. 

“My village is under goa’uld attack. Quantico, a village up-river from here. We need to hurry. My wife and son…”

Together, with the help of the Pastureland militia and the Primes, they had saved Quantico. But not without cost. Aaron’s wife, Haley, had been away from the family home, visiting a male ‘friend’… leaving her sister Jessica to care for little Jack. The ‘friend’s orchard farm on the out-skirts had been overrun, and all killed. But the attack had been stopped there. And it had been Spencer, executing a maneuver that had even Blair shaking his head, who had won the day. He had seen at once that the goa’uld attackers, a loose collection of twelve armed men and women, seemed to have been living rough for months from their starved, ragged and scruffy appearances. They had moved into the orchard compound and taken it over, killing and dumping the residents and fortifying its defenses, digging in as if intending to stay. Shutting his eyes tight, he had carefully located and counted each one, and then… gave them all a heavy blast of empathic power. It overwhelmed them, and caused them all to drop in a faint. Giving Blair and the local shamans time enough to safely de-goa’uld the victims.

With such strength and skill, it wasn’t surprising that Spencer should be proclaimed Alpha. And at his side, Hotch was a match for him, in every way. After Hayley’s funeral, Aaron had immediately bonded with Spencer, sold out his farm, packed up Jess and Jack, to move them all to a new home in DeeCee. He had even made preparations for bringing Diana Reid, Spencer’s mother, to DeeCee, to reunite them. 

The life of a militia-man, getting the necessary training to survive at the side of a sentinel, had been… challenging for him, but satisfying. For numerous reasons, the wide-open plains and hills of their sparsely-populated province seemed to attract outlaws, running from their pasts and crimes, seeking easy targets in any remote farm or ranch. Most were loners, but some banded together in gangs, and were that much more dangerous. And then there was the ever-present threat of the goa’uld… Spencer found he had a certain talent for assessing and unraveling the mysteries behind any crime, almost reading the criminal mind, as well as a strategic skill for planning defenses and counter-strikes. And his sentinel? Fired by a sentinel’s need to protect, the senses of a supreme hunter, and a hunger for justice… was his perfect mate.

Spencer had never regretted any of it.

Now, it seemed as if another lost soul was about to escape the stifling and corrupt confines of Lantean control. 

In something close to a trance, almost, but not quite, hovering on the edge of a Spirit Walk, Spencer felt Luna take his metaphorical hand and point to the looming negative presences around the budding shaman.

First, the father… a repugnant blight all on his own, stained and darkened by the crimes he had committed, oily with smugness at getting away with it all. Spencer thought his own father had been bad… walking out on he and his mom when she first showed signs of delusions and madness. But William Reid had nothing on this guy.

DiNozzo Senior was linked first to the stiff-backed soldier, the silver-haired man with the Security Force Division commander’s insignia. That harsh, experience-hardened man resisted any hint of weakness, but he was staring furiously at one of his own worst ones… his obsessive desire for that beautiful young man, soon to be dragged out of his reach. 

Which led to the father and daughter staring with gluttonous eyes at the same not-so-unaware prey. He wasn’t even real to them, but a pawn, a tool, a means to an end. What end? The woman rubbed at her belly. Ah, offspring. A child with a Gene. When no member of the David family possessed even a shadow of the ATA Gene, they needed that advantage to rise any higher among the Lantean Officer Elite. Eli had used cunning and ruthless tactics to dominate the Intel ranks, and trained his children to follow him. But only Ziva survived to carry on the family line, and it *must* include an ATA Gene, if Eli was to maintain his influence with the upper echelons, or, better yet, rise to them.

Considering DiNozzo Junior, perhaps only a few years older than himself, target of all these dreadful people, Spencer could only hope he and his fellow shamans were all seeing the truth… that he was indeed about to surface. It would be the only possible escape for this poor man, already scarred and dented from a life-time of abuse and suffering.

Å 

Dr. Charles Eppes was in agony, sitting with the rest of the Science Division. Even his friend and mentor, Dr. Larry Fleinhardt, could not calm him down. He wouldn’t be here at this appalling display of political bullying at all if it weren’t for his favorite student and protégé, Amita Ramanujan, about to have her first PhD conferred, promoted from trainee to full scientist.

But still… agony.

Because, there, down in the stands with the other Elpers, sat his father and brother, with the party from LA Province. Not his mother… no, his mother had died a few years ago… and he had been barred from going to her deathbed, even just to say goodbye… Because Charlie was cursed with the Atlantis Technology Activation Gene. A pretty damn strong one, too, an ATA-B. To say nothing of his handy way with math… Far surpassing even McKay, Reid and Zelenka in that particular, somewhat specialized, area. His value to the City had allowed him some privileges, but… not one of them even began to touch the loss of his family. 

They were there, just out of his reach, staring back at him, and those pained, yearning, resentful, angry stares probably mirrored his own. As soon as the marriages were performed, the Elpers would all be rushed to the reception in the Ballroom on the fifth floor of the Central Command Tower, while he and the rest of the Gene Orphans would be hustled back to their quarters on the tenth-thru-fifteenth floors. Through the next hours, the GOs would be kept in lockdown, until all of the Elpers had left the City, either to the Market Pier docks to board their ships, or picked up by shuttles, to be ferried back to their home provinces. 

Charlie would be given no chance to say even a word to his dad or brother. 

Alan Eppes was getting older. The thick black hair Charlie remembered had gone white with age. Too old? He looked well and hale enough… maybe he was okay? And Don… looking more like their father than ever, dark hair, dark eyes, stoic mask of a face, but his big brother must have joined one of the militias, to look that strong and fit. That would suit him, of course. He always had been the protector, the defender of the family, and particularly of his baby brother. 

Don, with a hidden ATA as strong as his own, had tried to teach him the trick he would need to fail the Gene test… but Charlie had been distracted by something the Lantean scientist had said, intrigued by the various simple devices in their testing kit… he hadn’t been focused or paying enough attention… and the damn life sign detector had lit up in his hand like a damn flashlight. So it was his own damn fault he had been ripped from his family. Don must hate him for that alone… but if their mom’s failing health had also been because of him…

If he could just say one word to them… how sorry he was, how much he missed them, how he hated the trap he was in… or even, that he had made the damn Gene Breeding law work for him, arranging to contract with Amita, in a few months to marry the beautiful and talented young woman he loved to distraction, when they both reached majority… would they be happy for him? Would they approve? Amita was another Gene Orphan like himself, from the Smuggler’s Reach island of India, so he could only hope they wouldn’t hate the idea of his marrying just any Lantean overlord’s daughter… 

If only he could find a way to get to them… maybe when the ceremonies were done, with everyone moving around, in the shuffle and confusion and mass desertion off the South Pier and the worsening weather, everyone hurrying to get inside, out of the wind… maybe the attention of the SFs would wander, distracted enough to let him stumble into the path of some Elpers…

Yeah. Maybe. He could sell that, if he had to. Just an accident, a moment of inattention from the absent-minded professor…

Å 

Tony could see them, clustered all around him, staring at him. Coyote, Bear, Wolf, Crow, Owl, Hare and Doe. Fascinated and focused on them, he missed the moment when the Captain completed his Inauguration Address, and passed the podium on once more to the Chief Warrant Officer, Robert Makepeace. It was his duty to dole out, first, the doctorates to the Science Division trainees. Then it was the turn of the awards winners, medals and commendations for service to the City. Then, the promotions in rank from among the Crew, including those completing their probationary apprenticeships. And, the penultimate ceremony, the assignments for the youth, Lantean and Gene Orphans alike, and the announcement of those who had been determined to be worthy, to be taken into each Division as apprentice trainees. 

Then, all too soon, it was time to officiate at the mass weddings. 

The Brides were ushered forward, and one after another, the Grooms were paired up with them, linking hands, names announced and contracts signed, ratified as official by Chief Warrant Officer Makepeace on behalf of the Captain. Tony remained in his seat, the last of them, until his father, with a growl, stepped forward, right through his bristling coyote, to grab his son by the collar, drag him to a stand, and push him forward. 

But Tony could not take even one step nearer to that vicious knife-wielding woman. She narrowed her dark eyes at him, then took the step herself, reaching for his hand.

With a shudder, even as she gripped him, hard, he saw into her soul. The touch made it impossible for him to shut her out of his head.

Cold-blooded, like a snake. Arrogant and entitled, as Eli’s daughter, basking in privilege, when all feared to cross the Intel Unit Chief. She was trained. She had skills she was inordinately proud of. She was her father’s daughter, in every way. She would do anything and everything to please him, to gain his approval, his attention. She would obey any order he gave, no matter how heinous. She had already obeyed too many. Including the murder of her own bastard Elper half-brother, for resisting their father’s will, hiding his strong Gene to stay with his mother’s people, daring to even attempt to go his own way. For that betrayal of his blood, Ari Haswari had deserved to die, in her estimation. That was what had made her own crime against blood acceptable to her. Although… it did quell that jealous part of her that had resented the eldest, the son, Eli’s anointed heir (if he had only bent to his father’s commands), with a Gene, where she had none.

And now, here she was, obeying yet one more command. To wed this walking clown, this turnip, so that she could produce the heir her father wanted, a child with the Gene. He was comely enough, and possessed no qualities that would threaten either herself or her father, would upset no plan they came up with. He wouldn’t even challenge her need to dominate and control every aspect of her, and his, life. She didn’t even mind that her father had cut a deal with Squadron Commander Gibbs, for a kind of… time-share of her new husband’s body. She had served the Commander in operations before, respected his intelligence and tactical brilliance… who knows, it might even be possible to share DiNozzo with Gibbs… at the same time. That made a pleasant picture in her head, of two such alpha, dominant personalities, subjugating such a pretty submissive. To make him kneel before them, tie him up, whip him, hurt him, force him into whatever service took their fancy… yes, she could feel her blood heat at so many intriguing possibilities…

With a gurgle of protest, and a scream suppressed through long practice, Tony ripped his hand away and backed, toward the front of the podium, toward the crowd. 

Standing with hands outthrust to push away anyone who dared approach, as his father, his Bride and Gibbs were trying to do. Their greedy and voracious hunger threatened to overwhelm, subjugate him, as they always had, without much resistance on his part… reaching to grab hold…

And there it was, the doorway he needed, opening at his will. And once open, he could pull what he needed from it, strength, will, abilities, power, his to command. 

He threw his head back and… 

It was a scream filled with over twenty years of pain, all let loose at once. 

The mental force of it blew all those on the podium off the back edge, drove them into cowering heaps. 

From the audience, the six Alpha Shamans rushed forward. They surrounded the shuddering, screaming young man, now on his knees, weeping and incoherent. 

Five Lanteans had been knocked senseless in the sudden unleashing of a shaman’s surfacing. The Captain, DiNozzo Senior, Commander Gibbs and both Davids. 

Chief Executive Officer Leon Vance attempted to take over and control the sudden eruption of chaos. He called up SFD personnel to aid in crowd control, and Chief Medical Officer Mallard to tend to the victims of this apparent psychic attack. He demanded the other Chiefs of the Officer Elite to get their heads out of their asses and assist, to clear the decks as quickly as possible. He might have turned angrily to the source of the disruption, to take the DiNozzo kid into custody and call him to account for daring to attack them, but a wall of sentinels stood in his way. 

“The Nineteenth Clause to the Novelle Charter,” Alpha Sentinel O’Neill barked out. “Any surfacing Shaman or manifesting Sentinel must be free to take training, or to seek their bond-mate, whoever, or wherever, they may be. DiNozzo is coming with us.”

Å


	3. Chapter 3: "DiNozzo is their problem now."

Å 

It wasn’t that easy, of course. But those with the most claim and who might be presumed to object the hardest, were all laid out flat and unconscious. So when Alpha Sentinel O’Neill made his claims, backed by the Alpha Sentinel Prime, and the Guardian Teams of six of the seven provinces of Novelle, there wasn’t a lot Vance could do. And the Judge Advocate General, AJ Chegwidden, also re-confirmed to his elected position, was there at his shoulder to tell him so, in no uncertain terms. Whatever legal objections and claims were possible to pull back DiNozzo Junior to the City, they would have to be made later, according to established procedure. And Chief Executive Officer and Second in Command Leon Vance was all about procedure.

He was well aware that this was a battle they had already lost twice in the past ten years: for Dr. McKay and Dr. Reid, both men with the ATA Gene and staggering genius, heavy losses for the Lantean Science Division. DiNozzo Junior was no loss there, but his Gene was rated higher than any in his generation, and had already proved it would breed true in his off-spring. Losing his breeding potential was no doubt a heavy loss too, but he was pretty sure that bastard DiNozzo Senior had socked away plenty of live sperm in stasis for later use. 

With a sigh, Leon considered that half the coming generation of the City might end up being DiNozzos, which wouldn’t be a good thing… the Lanteans were already at considerable risk of in-breeding.

But that problem was for another day. Leon had enough to contend with, just getting all the damn Elpers off his City, and waiting for the coming explosion when Kinsey, DiNozzo Senior and the Davids woke up.

Å 

“Dad! Don!... Alan!” Charlie cried out urgently, shoving through the bewildered masses, standing around in confusion. This was working out for him better than he could have wished. With the SFs trying to get the crowds moving, and the crowds lingering, if only in hopes of witnessing more excitement, no one was paying any attention to one lone scientist. Or rather, two, because Amita hung to his sleeve and wouldn’t let go. 

The delegation from LA Province, or rather, *’Llanuras de los Angeles’*, was smaller than the others, and not as well attended or defended. The name, like Pastureland’s *‘Foro Boario Italia’*, derived from another dead language of the lost home-world… apparently it had once meant ‘Plains of the Angels’. LA was mostly wide, sweeping prairie, high-mesa plateaus on the interior of the southern continent, dotted with far-flung isolated villages and towns, sometimes called the heartland, or the bread-basket of Novelle. They had only their council leaders and a few sentinels present at this ceremony. LA had no Guardian Team, since they lacked a shaman who could raise a sentinel to the alpha level. Their last alpha pair had been killed in the Satedan disaster, more than a decade ago. 

Right now, the LA Council Leadership was huddled together, whispering urgently to each other. At the center of the group were the three Elders. The diminutive figure with the unlikely brown hair caught up in a severe bun was Henrietta Lange, a formidable woman well known even on Atlantis for her intelligence, political savvy and ruthless determination to protect what she considered to be hers. Towering at her side but actually medium-height, was a gaunt-looking man in iron grey hair, Owen Granger, once Hetty’s apprentice, now a leader in his own right, and, so rumor had it, often at odds with her. The third, with hair gone white now, tall, thin, dark eyes betraying worry and stress, was their Planner, Alan Eppes.

Alan lifted his head, hearing his name shouted in a desperate call… It took him a moment to recognize the young man. After all, it had been years, and he had only been six years old at the time, and a little undersized for his age… still a little on the short side, but his longish, curly dark hair was familiar, and so were those dark eyes… and he knew. From that moment on, nothing else existed for the older man. 

“Charlie! Oh, Higher Powers… Charlie…” tears in his eyes, Alan stumbled to collide with his youngest son, wrapping him tightly in his arms as they both began to hiccup on happy laughter. “Oh Powers, Charlie, it’s been so long, son… I’d hoped I could catch a glimpse of you, maybe, just a glimpse, but… Are you okay? Are they treating you well? We’ve heard such awful stories of bullying and abuse for Gene Orphans…”

“I’m fine, Dad. I’m fine. I’m too smart for them to risk my life or good will, especially after they lost McKay and Reid… Dad, this is Amita Ramanujan. She’s… well, we have an understanding. When we reach legal age in a few months, we have pledged to each other. She’s another Gene Orphan Dad, not Lantean… Her family is from India, Smuggler’s Reach…”

Alan blinked shocked eyes at the beautiful young woman at his son’s side, clinging to him with determination. He could see past her dusky skin, raven hair and black eyes to a strong and steadfast person… not unlike his late and dearly missed wife. “Marriage? But you’re just a baby… *were* just a baby… Oh Powers, has it been so long?”

“Still just a baby, Councilor Eppes,” Amita maintained with a smile. “But you do not need to worry. I will protect him, to my last breath.”

Alan smiled at the staunch supporter of his baby boy. “I am sure you will. If you two need my blessing… you have it. I just want to know you’re happy, Charlie. That’s all your mother and I ever wanted for you, no matter where you are.”

“I… I would be a lot happier back at home with you and Don, I can’t deny that, but… if that can’t be, this is the next best thing. And I have Amita. So… Don? Donny? Powers, Don, I’m sorry… I’m so so sorry… I should have listened to you, I should have…”

“Hey, kiddo,” Don waved the stammered apologies away. “Give your big brother a hug, why don’t you.”

“Hey!” shouted a uniformed SF, striding up with weapon in hand, grim scowl on his face, to shove the two scientists back from the Elpers. “No fraternization! Back off there, Elpers!” He glanced at the yellow armbands the young pair would have to wear until they came of age. “And you, scientist trainees, back to your dorms. Now!”

Charlie could only sigh and wave, hiding more tears as he and Amita were forced to turn away. 

Leaving Alan and Don with an aching sense of loss. 

Hetty and Owen moved up to join them. Hetty said, “Alan? Come on. I know how you must be feeling right now, but we have to go. There’s a shuttle ready to take us back to LA.”

“You go ahead, Dad,” Don recommended, and made a sign to his fellow sentinel, militia Team Lead Ian Edgerton, to join them. “I’ve got an invitation to join the Guardian Teams. O’Neill says they’re keeping a place for one of us on Sheppard’s ship, if we want it.”

Edgerton, a dark and sharp-eyed sentinel, lifted an eyebrow in query, an unspoken, ‘Why you, and not me?’ True, Don out-ranked him, the LA Militia Squadron Leader, but rank wasn’t that important in LA without an Alpha pair to lead, and this wasn’t a rank situation. 

Alan might have been too upset, still, staring after his youngest son as he was herded into a nearby tower and the waiting transport cabinet, but Hetty’s ears perked up.

“O’Neill and Sheppard want one of us with them?”

Don nodded. “And all things considered, I think we want one of our own to be there. There are going to be… issues, regarding the new shaman. I think one of us needs to be there too.”

Hetty’s eyes narrowed. “Yes… yes, Sentinel Eppes, I agree. You should join them, while the rest of us return home by shuttle.”

She was a pretty sly operator. It had stood her in good stead all her years on the Council. And with Owen at her side, a pretty crafty guy in his own right… They were seeing something in this situation that Alan hadn’t figured out yet. He would be an idiot to ignore their advice. And while he might not be the genius in the family, he wasn’t a complete boob, either.

“Yeah. Fine. Okay. Are we leaving now?”

“*Right* now. Come on, Alan. We’ll get you squared away so you can have a good cry in private… or maybe a good stiff scotch. Or both.”

“Donny?”

“Yeah, Dad, I’ll be finding a quiet corner for a good cry, too. And a scotch.”

Hetty smirked. “I’m sure you will. I trust Sheppard and McKay are well stocked.”

Ian lingered a moment more. “Don?”

“Don’t worry. I won’t take advantage of the situation. But I think we need to make sure DiNozzo makes his way to LA, one way or another.”

Slowly, Ian nodded. “You know we can count on Ellison and Sandburg. The Primes have made sure every shaman in the past ten years has come to LA first when looking for a sentinel partner.”

“And I trust them. I do. But the Lanteans… them I don’t trust further than I could throw the City.”

Ian nodded with a sigh. “And too many of them reek of lust when they look at DiNozzo. Right. You sure I shouldn’t be with you?”

“One unbonded sentinel on the close confines of a ship with an unbonded newly-surfaced shaman is already pressing our luck. O’Neill and Sheppard aren’t going to tolerate more than that, even if Sandburg does. Look after my Dad, Ian. Seeing Charlie… that’s a mind-fuck all on its own. Get him home safe and sound.”

Ian nodded. “Count on me, Don.”

Å 

All but the Smuggler’s Reach delegation had come to the Inauguration Ceremony aboard Lantean shuttles, but some of them were leaving on Sheppard’s *Puddle Jumper*, berthed at the Market Pier docks. Guardian vanguards and team techs had been talked into returning to their settlements via shuttle, in escort for their councilors, elders and other representatives. It was the quickest and safest way, and would enable them to ‘hold the fort’ until their Alphas got home. Because all the Alphas insisted they had to remain close to the newest surfaced shaman.

Since most had come expecting this to be a single-day affair, one might expect very few had even a single change of clothes with them. However, habit and painful experience had Sentinels dragging go-bags with them, nagging their shaman partners to do the same, easily-carried packs supplied with night clothes, basic toiletries, their weapons of choice, and a set of work-out clothes. Don Eppes, a sentinel and leader of the LA militia, had also brought his go-bag. 

Not that Sheppard worried about supplying those who weren’t so well prepared. His ship was *extremely* well stocked with the oddest and varied collection of items. 

So it was only Tony DiNozzo who lacked anything more than the clothes on his back.

Not that he noticed. As soon as Alpha Shaman Prime Blair Sandburg reached him, having torn away from that poisonous female and still screaming on his knees, the brand-new shaman collapsed in a heap, and was carried away by a collection of sentinels. O’Neill stood as rear-guard to fend off interference from the Lanteans as they hustled the kid away to the *Puddle Jumper*, then out of sight below decks. As Sheppard and his crew prepared to get underway, the shamans all converged on Tony’s bunk, and the sentinels hung out on the deck to watch John’s crew at work. 

John had to admit, with some pride, that the operation was well worth the attention.

Like a well oiled machine, Teyla and Ronon had but to deliver a few signals or words of direction, and Lorne, Cadman, Stackhouse and Markham jumped to, slipping lines, pulling up anchor, unfurling sails and prepping for adjustments as they tacked into the wind to pull away from Atlantis docks. Once clear of the piers, beyond the invisible Shield demarcation, they could fully set sails and turn before the wind, to race away into the open sea. Their course was set for the nearest settlement port, on the east coast of the northern continent, Cheyenne, the capitol of the SGC Province. 

In the back of his head, John heard the plaintive voice of Atlantis, saying, ‘Please, John, take care of him. I could not, and he has suffered so…’

Closing his eyes even as he took the helm, John whispered back, “Don’t worry, sweetheart. We’ll have his back from here on.”

It was an oath and a promise he felt confident to give her. After all, it was the sentinel mandate, to Protect the Guide, Protect the Tribe. Whoever DiNozzo Junior’s sentinel was, they would find him or her soon enough, and the kid would be protected to within an inch of his life ever after. Like McKay, standing at John’s shoulder.

Å 

Once they were clear, John called the Alpha Sentinels to the ward-room. The LA sentinel was also invited, and John wasn’t too surprised when Don Eppes eagerly joined them. Another hidden Gene-carrier, a strong ATA-B. His sentinel abilities were pretty impressive, too, although, of course, without a shaman partner to guide him, he had to keep dialed down, or risk a sensory overload and a zone. LA had been without an Alpha Guardian pair for a long time, but once Don found his shaman partner, if he ever did, they would no doubt be Alphas. 

Of course, it was altogether possible that Don’s partner was lying unconscious in a bunk below decks right now, being fussed over by the Alpha Shaman conclave.

Jim Ellison might be the Alpha Sentinel Prime of Novelle, but he was by nature a taciturn man, so usually it was O’Neill who bulldozed to the front of these meetings, with everyone’s amused acceptance. The man was a warrior to the bone and a natural leader in every cell of his body. His tactical abilities were awesome. With his many years of experience in every kind of crisis, and proven track record of success, it was no hardship to defer to the man.

“Okay, gang, I think we can expect a hornet’s nest with this one. Maybe worse than when we sprung McKay. Certainly worse than for the Reid kid. No matter that McKay was their CSO, no matter how smart they both are, or how valuable to the City, as far as the Officer Elite is concerned, they’re just two more geeks on a City already over-run with techno-dweebs. Our boys didn’t have bastards like Kinsey, DiNozzo Senior or the Davids drooling over them. Now, I gather we all agree we think the kid isn’t as brain-dead as the Lanteans think? Yes? Do we also agree, we’re keeping him?”

“Hell yes,” John spoke up from his post, leaning against the bulkhead next to the ward-room porthole, glancing at Don Eppes. 

“No argument from me,” Aaron Hotchner of Pastureland said. Ellison merely nodded.

“The more it riles up the Lanteans, the better I like it,” teen Buffy Summers growled out. 

Harry Potter gave her a grin. “I can’t argue with an attitude like that.”

Don Eppes nodded curtly, then said, “But… you heard the City, right? He does have an uber-Gene, after all. She wants him safe, and he can’t be much safer than with a sentinel. As soon as we know who that is.”

Hotch studied O’Neill. “You anticipate trouble? I would have thought they might let him go, since even his father doesn’t seem to know what they’ve lost.”

O’Neill frowned down at his hands. “Danny says those bastards were counting on having a Gene-carrier in their total control. DiNozzo Senior has made his rank in the Officer Elite based on the kid’s sperm. Without him… Senior has a lot of pull, can call in a lot of favors, and knows where a lot of bodies are buried. Literally, I suspect. He practically owns Kinsey. And the Davids… well, I think a lot of us have run into them in the field. Eli’s a bastard of the first order. Slimy, manipulative, ruthless… he’s got a lot of the same influence as Senior. And they both want what young Tony has, in large freaking amounts. If Senior has the Gene, it’s not much more than a shadow, and Eli doesn’t have one at all. Nor does his daughter. If they want to climb to the Officer Elite, if Senior wants to stay there, they need that kid on their hook. That makes them dangerous. I don’t think anyone on Atlantis had that much of a *personal* stake in either McKay or Reid… no matter how smart they are. Smarts just makes for a threat to the status quo, so they weren’t of *personal* interest to the power-makers. McKay was a pain in their patoot from the beginning, and Reid never really counted as any more than a transplant Elper, as far as they were concerned. Neither McKay nor Reid represent the kind of asset that kid does. And when they think he’s a vegetable? All the better to control and manipulate the poor schmuck to get exactly what they want. As for Leroy Jethro Gibbs…”

Everyone winced. It hadn’t been lost on anyone with sentinel senses that Gibbs was a fulminating tempest of lust, frustration and fury, an explosion waiting to happen, and all focused on DiNozzo Junior.

O’Neill continued his analysis of the situation.

“A lot of us have encountered him, too. Second ‘B’ for Bastard. A brilliant commander, don’t get me wrong, a tactical genius, of his kind… but… well. Cold hearted as a fish, no more sympathy for Elpers than any other Lantean, in spite of the fact that his mother and wife were both Gene Orphans. He lost his wife and daughter in a Goa’uld attack. That makes him a *lot* more inclined to go after the Goa’uld than most, but… that doesn’t translate into him giving *us* a break in any way, and it certainly won’t stop him coming after DiNozzo Junior the first chance he gets.”

“So what’s your plan?” Don Eppes asked.

Ellison spoke for the first time. “He comes with Blair and me for now. He has to be trained, no matter what else, and that *no one* can prevent, according to the Charter. We can keep him under wraps for a while. Best case, he finds his sentinel, they bond, and his life’s his own. Well, his and his sentinel’s. If he doesn’t find a sentinel…” Ellison shrugged. 

Aaron Hotchner, their unofficial expert in the Novelle Charter provisions, shifted uncomfortably. “I’m not really sure what would happen in that case. Presumably, that would mean his sentinel is still latent. No one liberated from Atlantis for being a shaman has ever been in that position. Technically, I suppose, even according to the Nineteenth Clause, he could be sent back once he’s completed shaman training and his sentinel search, if he comes up empty. The Lanteans could re-assert their claim due to his Gene, if he doesn’t have a physical tie to any settlement, either through blood family, or a sentinel. They *could* claim that his sentinel is as likely to be some latent on Atlantis as in the settlements.”

John Sheppard tore his attention away from the antsy and unhappy Eppes. “No problem. In that case, we can send him somewhere even the Lanteans can’t find him. Play a shell game with him, move him around if we have to. Maybe it would be a good idea to plan on doing that anyway, just in case someone gets the bright idea that kidnapping will solve their custody problems. We have precedent on our side. It’s how we get our own shamans to find their sentinels. But, seriously, I doubt that’s going to be a problem. He’s got all the makings of an Alpha. He’ll find his sentinel. They all do, usually before they even get out of training.”

Å 

In the cabin where the shamans had assembled to care for the newest of them, their brother was curled in a tight fetal ball of abject misery, hovering on the ragged edge of passing out, but unable to tip over either way, to conk out altogether, or to rouse himself. And he wasn’t in much better shape when Blair tried to peer at his Spirit Plane shadow. His coyote was at his side, but it was whimpering and helpless with pain as well.

Blair had managed to get a protective bubble around him, both to limit emotional input, and how much of his hurt was projected out to the rest of them. But he couldn’t shield anyone from themselves. He could have forced him to sleep, but he was reluctant to do that. If Tony couldn’t deal with this himself, he might never be able to face it and take proper control. 

“This is a life-time of pain,” Daniel winced. “He isn’t going to be able to push it all down any more, not like he has up until now.”

Willow, the youngest of them, looked around her brothers and sister, not really understanding. “But he’s safe now. We have him. All he has to do is wake up, and we can tell him he’s safe.”

Spencer shook his head. “He won’t believe it. He can’t believe it. And to be truly safe, he needs a sentinel. And…” Spencer hesitated, glancing warily at Willow and Luna.

McKay’s mouth twisted unhappily. “It’s rape, isn’t it? He’s been raped. Maybe a lot. After all, as far as DiNozzo Senior was concerned, he was just a doll to rent out in one marriage contract after another, or pass around to his Officer Elite buddies. That bastard Gibbs sure took advantage. Who knows how long that was going on.”

Willow cringed away, and Luna blinked. The Hogwarts shaman ventured, “But it was the touch of the Intel officer, his intended bride, that sent him into this state. It was her intentions that broke him open. He’s been married before. He’s bred children with other women.”

“You don’t count that as rape?” Daniel asked softly.

“I do,” McKay declared, his chin jutting out defiantly. “And there are rumors about that David woman… She plays… hard. She enjoys inflicting pain, tying her lovers up. There’s whispers about whips and paddles. And you all felt it… that heartless bastard Gibbs has been making nightly visits to the DiNozzo quarters. That couldn’t have been fun.”

Blair sighed, shaking his head. “He’s not going to be ready for *anyone* to get close… not for a while. If ever.”

Daniel shrugged. “Maybe he doesn’t have to. There are other shamans who haven’t bonded with anyone. There are sentinels who haven’t got a bond-mate, either. That doesn’t stop them having a working partnership.”

“But at his level?” Spencer asked dubiously. “He’s alpha. He vibrates with it. If he can’t cope with his own power, can’t get control of his shields, he’ll need the stability of a sentinel-bond to function in any kind of practical day-to-day way.”

Blair held up his hands. “Okay. Okay. The kid has issues, that’s clear enough. But… can’t you feel it? He’s got a resilience, an ability to adapt, to change… like a chameleon. Protective coloration. That’s got to count for something. And under that there’s a core of steel. He might be overwhelmed right now, but give him a chance. He’ll have to deal with his problems, one way or another, shaman or not. We can help him there, to come to some kind of acceptance, to deal. After that… well. Time is the only healer I can think of in this case. Let him get his emotions under control, face his demons and nightmares, and get him trained up, as best we can.”

“And if he’s never ready for a sentinel? Can’t, or won’t, find his?” Willow ventured hesitantly.

Blair shrugged. “Then we’ll… I dunno… keep him moving, maybe? That’s the scheme our sentinels are working on. If he can’t connect on the Spirit Plane, or, as you say, Willow, he won’t, then we do what we usually do with new shamans. We send him to trawl through the provinces until he lucks onto a partner he can work with.”

McKay shook his head. “It’s not going to be that easy, Blair. The kid has enemies. Powerful, influential enemies. They’ll want him back, so they can hold onto their own power bases, which all depend on having a strong Gene-carrier on their hooks. Kinsey, DiNozzo Senior, the Davids… and that bastard Gibbs won’t want to let go, either.”

Daniel frowned, three vertical lines appearing between his dark, expressive eyebrows. “Keeping him moving will still work, I think, in the long term, to keep him out of their clutches. For right now, though, we tell the Lanteans the truth, that he needs more than the usual training, because of his past trauma and the high level he’s liable to be. Surfacing with his shaman abilities have begun to heal the old and existing wounds, but… well, clearly, he needs time. After all, he’ll have to reach some level of functional status, before we can even begin training him up.”

Blair grinned at his old friend. “Oh man… that’s a brilliant bit of obfuscation. It’s even mostly the truth! Mostly. If they want to interfere, take him back, we’ll move him around. Take it in turns to mentor him. You hear that, Tony? We’re not going to let them take you back, man. We’re keeping you with us, no matter what. You don’t need to worry about a sentinel, or bonding with anyone, not until you’re ready. And if you never are… well, we’ll find a way to get you through this. You hear me? It’s gonna be okay, buddy. We’ll make certain of it.”

Å 

Dr. Donald ‘Ducky’ Mallard watched as his patients slowly recovered from their psychic shock. He’d never seen such a case, although there were records of it happening before, when a particularly strong alpha shaman was in dire distress, and lashed out at his or her attackers. He had no doubt that young Anthony had more than enough cause. Sudden surfacing, in his case, when he might lack any intellectual ability to reason through his emotions, or to consciously control them… well. 

Jethro was the first to come awake, after three days, groaning and holding his head. 

“Yes, my friend, I have no doubt you have the mother and father of all headaches. Take deep breaths… allow the analgesic I have given you to kick in.” 

Ducky’s very voice was a soothing balm to his patients, a soft burr of an accent picked up from his youth in the Cascade highlands, before he tested positive for the ATA Gene (a mere medium-level ATA-C, but enough for them) and had been forcibly removed from his mother’s care. Many years ago, now… but still a bitter memory for the gentle, but sharp-minded doctor. 

“What the hell happened, Duck?”

“It appears young Anthony DiNozzo Junior is a shaman. He surfaced, rather suddenly and violently, at the marriage ceremony. In an act of self-defense, he sent out a wave of psychic energy, rather like a punch, to those he considered a threat to him.”

Gibbs swallowed on that. “He’s a shaman?”

“Without any doubt whatsoever. He left with the Alpha Shaman Prime and the other Elpers. I’m not sure what even Blair Sandburg can do is this case, but… they’ll do their best to either teach him or control him.”

“They took him?” Gibbs demanded, anger rising in him like a tempest. “They just took him? And Kinsey let them?”

“Ah, yes, well… they do have the law on their side in this instance. The Nineteenth Clause of the Charter was cited. And as for the Captain, I fear he was… incapacitated, just as you were.”

That was more effective in preventing the commander to rise from his infirmary cot than Ducky’s gentle hand on his chest. Gibbs blinked at him. 

“Kinsey too? Who else?”

“DiNozzo Senior, and Eli David and his daughter. They’re in the beds next to you. And, Jethro, it isn’t like you not to be aware of your surroundings to such an extent. I suggest you would do well to take this time to relax, assemble your faculties, and begin to think.”

“Kinsey’s out? So… Leon gave him up to the damn Elpers.”

“As I said, according to the law, he had no choice. There were no grounds to prevent it.”

“The hell there weren’t! We could charge the kid with assault… assault against the Captain. That’s high crime. That’s reason enough to hold him, at least for a little while.”

“To what end? Young Anthony certainly does not count as being of sound mind, or in any way aware of his actions. DiNozzo Senior had him declared incompetent years ago, and I signed off on the diagnosis myself. His choice of target in this instance certainly indicates as much… why would he see any threat in the five of you?”

Gibbs glanced warily at the elderly doctor. Ducky’s expression was bland in the extreme. Not wanting to look at that question too deeply, Gibbs merely scowled and swung his legs over the edge of the cot. 

“Jethro! I cannot advise you to leave the infirmary. Psychic shock can have some nasty and unpredictable side effects, and…”

“Got things to do, Duck. I’ll check in later, if only to find out what’s going on with Kinsey and the Davids.”

“And DiNozzo Senior?”

Gibbs had some very conflicting feelings about the Chief Procurement Officer. “Yeah, yeah, him too.”

Å 

The Central Command Tower was seventy-odd floors in the very center of Atlantis. As if altitude equated to status, the higher up you were, the more important you were. 

The very top-most pinnacle housed the Shuttle Bay, with re-charging berths for one hundred twenty eight of the blunt-nosed space-capable craft. According to the geeks, the City Builders had used a base-eight numbering system – hence the strange number. But over time, shuttles had been lost, crashed, or simply wore out and were not repaired, so there were only seventy one left, and eighteen of those were on the disabled list. With the current power restrictions in effect, only twelve shuttles were actually charged for use. The staging floor of the Bay had a hatch that would iris open so a shuttle could be lowered into the level below… why, no one knew. They actually only used the Bay roof hatch, that released the shuttles above the City. 

Levels sixty nine and sixty eight formed a large open atrium space. The upper mezzanine level, the Operations Deck, contained control consoles (when powered), sensor equipment (when working) and various and sundry monitoring stations and interfaces with City systems (when needed). Most of it was shut off or disconnected, since almost all of it had to do with systems required for space flight, such as navigation, telemetry and life support. The few related to monitoring the various minor life support sub-systems and the Shield were the only consoles lit up at the moment. Also on this level were the offices of the Officer Elite: for the Captain and his Executive Officers. It also held conference rooms for Officer use. Balconies from this tallest structure in the City gave an unparalleled view of all below, and the ocean all around them.

From this level, you could walk down the wide central staircase, or look out over the lower level, some kind of large, open staging area, where shuttles could be lowered and prepped. To go nowhere, apparently. Apart from guard stations and access to the outer halls and transport cabinets, the only other thing under the lights of the massive stained-glass windows was the *Astrea Porta*, a huge round ring of naquadah, incised with curious symbols no one knew the meaning of. The purpose of this thing was likewise unknown. The floor in front and behind it had been marked off, in a region called ‘the splash zone’ for no known reason. It had been noted that it was large enough for a shuttle to pass through… to land on the floor on the other side, like some kind of trained dog trick. So why… It also had one whole console devoted to controlling its operation (whatever that might be), and a shield kept over it. Console, device and shield were all incredible power hogs, however, so all had been disconnected and moth-balled, possibly even before the Exodus period. 

Chief Executive Officer Leon Vance often found himself standing at the upper railing, gazing at the undeniably beautiful alien device, musing on its existence and purpose. It made a pleasant relaxation from his usual stresses. His office could sometimes feel more like a trap, a bit on the claustrophobic side… and no Lantean, raised in the wide-open spaces of the City, liked that feeling much. On his desk tablet he had a window, supplied by the Science Division geeks, counting down the time until the last ZPM that powered Atlantis should completely run out of juice. 

No one else in the Officer Elite wanted to think about that day, so Leon felt he had to. For one thing, everyone currently housed in the Central Command Tower would immediately demand to be moved. No more would altitude equal status. All it would mean was more stairs to climb, with the transport cabinets dark and dead. In this, his thoughts unconsciously echoed Tony’s earlier observations. No, everyone would want billets as close to the sea-level decks as they could get. At that point, it wouldn’t hurt to open more towers, anyway, no power to drain any longer. Anything below sea level would have to be relocated, however, as soon as possible, because there would be no pumps to keep them from flooding. In fact, it might sooner or later be necessary to evacuate the whole City. The geeks weren’t sure how much of the City’s ability to provide water or sewage would still be functional, or how they were to generate potable water without the desalinization facility. Speculation was that the City itself might founder and sink. 

Since no one else was concerned with contingencies, Leon had taken advantage, and already relocated Jackie and the kids to a comfortable residence suite on the second floor of the CCT. Being the first to think of it had meant he had his choice of accommodations, and Jackie had fully endorsed his decision. Sure, the closer to sea level the greater the danger from the goa’uld, which is why he went with second floor, not first. 

The Science Division geeks had been madly tooling up an alternate shuttle hanger on the South Pier, for that inevitable day when the City would lose power, and they would need to find some way to charge the shuttles somewhere more accessible. Those little craft might be their only way off a City ready to tip over and drown them all.

And with that pleasant thought bouncing around his head, it was the perfect time for hurricane Gibbs to appear.

“What the hell, Leon! You just let them take DiNozzo?”

With a sigh, Leon gestured to his open office door. “Let’s do this in private, shall we, Commander Gibbs?” And once the angry man had flounced in and dropped into the guest chair, Vance deliberately closed the office door. With his modest ATA-D Gene, closing and locking doors was as much as he could do. He took his own chair behind his glass desk. He chewed on the toothpick in his mouth, and considered reaching into his drawer for a painkiller. He knew this was coming, and more besides, when the other Inauguration Day victims came around. 

“Hello to you too, Squadron Commander Gibbs. What can I do for you this afternoon? Oh wait, I think I know. You want DiNozzo Junior returned to us. Well, that’s not going to happen. I have already had this out with our Judge Advocate General. JAG Chegwidden says there is no justification for us keeping DiNozzo. The Alpha Shaman Prime was well within his rights to take custody of the boy. There’s nothing I can do about it. And before you start yelling, even the Captain has no jurisdiction or rights in this case. It’s the Nineteenth Clause of the Charter.”

“That piece of garbage! Hasn’t that damned clause cost us enough already?”

“Maybe,” Leon granted. “It’s still the law. What did you expect me to do?”

“Delay! Stall them! Keep Tony on the City until I could be there! Charge him with assault on the Captain… assault on Crew… he laid five of us out cold, it would have been an obvious way to hang on to him until we could find a counter-measure. But no, you just let them carry him off! Where is he now?”

“With the Alpha Shaman Prime, I would presume.”

Gibbs narrowed his eyes at the man who was, technically, his boss. “You telling me you’re not tracking him?”

Leon held Gibbs’ fulminating ice-blue eyes for a moment… before dropping them with a frustrated sigh. “I tried. The scan on his transponder cut out.”

“What do you mean, cut out?” Gibbs demanded, rubbing his upper arm, where his own transponder had been injected. Every Lantean had one, injected when they were tested for the Gene. As far as Gibbs was aware, the things would continue transmitting to the City for a century or more, regardless of whether the subject was alive or dead.

Leon squirmed. “It’s… complicated. But… in certain unusual circumstances, the City seems to have some kind of coding that enables it to... shut off transponders for those no longer considered citizens. Apparently, as soon as DiNozzo was identified as a shaman and the Nineteenth Clause invoked, the City registered DiNozzo as no longer a citizen.”

“So what you’re telling me is… we lost him?”

“The Guardian pairs all left on the *Puddle Jumper*, along with DiNozzo. It’ll take more than a ten-day for them to reach the nearest port, even in good weather, and that’s in Stargate Commune. Another ten to dock in Cascade. So for the next two ten-days, at the least, yes, we know exactly where DiNozzo is.”

Gibbs snorted. “*Puddle Jumper*. The same smuggler ship the coast guard hasn’t been able to track, eluding them for years now?”

Leon rubbed at his temple. “Well… yes. But Sandburg will demand DiNozzo be taken to Cascade for training. That’s where he’ll be for the foreseeable future. So no, DiNozzo isn’t lost. He’s just not our problem anymore. You want to argue your case, you take it up with the JAG. But he’s going to tell you the same damn thing he already told me. Until the newly surfaced shaman is trained and competent, if ever, or under their control to keep from lashing out like that again, they have complete custody. He’s out of our hands. DiNozzo is their problem now.”

Å


	4. Chapter 4: "The Lanteans are gone."

Å 

Tony heard the soft whispers all around him. 

‘You’re safe. You’re safe now. They’ll protect you, as I could not.’

Slowly, Tony ventured to open his eyes… to a blue jungle glade. 

The ragged, grinning coyote was lying at his side, head in his lap as he sat with legs crossed in the long grass. Before him, long fingers weaving odd shapes in the air, a young woman with stark white hair, pale skin and kaleidoscope eyes, sat facing him. She gave him a smile when she noted his attention, mesmerized by her fingers and the glittering flower petals that appeared, opened in vivid colorful blooms, then vanished in her hands. 

“Good morning, Tony. Are you feeling better?”

“Um… yes. I think so. You’re Alpha Shaman Luna Lovegood of Hogwarts.”

“Ah. You know me.”

“Well, I know *of* you… I surfaced, then? I’m a shaman?”

“Yes. Alpha Sentinel Jack O’Neill and Alpha Shaman Prime Blair Sandburg invoked the Nineteenth Clause of the Novelle Charter to take custody of you. We’re aboard the *Puddle Jumper* right now…” The young woman grinned with glittering eyes, much like the flowers still flashing in her hands. “It’s a smuggler’s ship! So exciting… like breaking the law, only not quite… we’re almost pirates! I’ve never been on a sailing ship before. It’s quite wonderful. All that fresh sea air… quite invigorating. And the rocking, once you get used to it, is very calming. I don’t think I’ve ever slept so well in my life. When you wake up, you can go up on deck. Maybe even learn to fish, like Jack, Jim and Blair. Teyla, a shaman on Alpha Sentinel John Sheppard’s crew, is teaching me and Alpha Shaman Willow Rosenberg to weave nets. It’s a lot easier and more efficient way to fish than the lines and hooks… the poor worms… although, Jack caught a larval goa’uld, and was quite… um… *happy* to spear it on his hook for bait… worked well, too… he called it Junior.” She wrinkled her nose at the thought.

Tony blinked at the artless chatter of the young woman. It was almost like his daughter Abby’s run-away tongue, from the surveillance videos he had seen of her, although with a serene and gentle softness that Abby could never match, energetic and excitable little munchkin that she was. 

“So… there are a lot of sentinels and shamans on this… ship… right now?”

“Oh, everyone wanted to come with you, all of us Elpers who were at the Inauguration, but there’s only so much space on *Puddle Jumper*, so it’s just the Alpha pairs, and a sentinel from the LA delegation. They’ve been making plans and discussing contingencies… in case the Lanteans don’t want to let us keep you. Which sounds terrible, now I come to say it aloud… like you were a lost puppy, or a found piece of discarded furniture, or something. It isn’t that we mean to decide your future for you… but, you see, we didn’t know if you were capable of making your own decisions or not. Now that I can see you are, we’ll present them more as options, and you can tell us what you want to do, yourself. Is that okay?”

Tony took a deep breath. “I… I suppose so. I’m not too used to actually having any options. I’ve been so focussed on hiding… waiting for any way to escape… Anything to get away… I never really thought it would happen, too afraid to hope, in case it didn’t… So beyond getting as far from my father as I can possible get, and making sure he can never get his filthy claws on me again… That’s it, as far as my options are concerned. Anything else is… So… Um… Where are we going?”

“Well, we’ll be docking at the port in Cheyenne first, capital of Stargate Commune Province, then heading for Cascade. Eventually, we’ll land in all of the provinces to drop off passengers. In the normal run of things, you would join Blair in Cascade at the Shaman Sanctuary there, for training. But…” Luna frowned vaguely, tilting her head to one side as she studied him.

“But?” Tony prompted when she hesitated.

“But I don’t think you’re going to need much training at all. Do you realise that you have created your own mental shields already, while still mostly unconscious?”

“Um…”

“They’re quite strong and resilient. You seem to have excellent control of them, too. I can barely feel your turmoil any more, and it’s been quite… upsetting, since you first surfaced. Can you feel any of the people around you?”

Tony was tentative about reaching out… he still shuddered from the acid-like burn from the last person who had touched him… at least while he was conscious… but he closed his eyes, and… 

“There’s only you in the room with me… but I can feel… many more, on deck. They’re all focussed on their jobs… washing down the decks, mending canvas and nets... there’s a couple in the... galley, I guess, making a meal for everyone... and… is that O’Neill at the rails, catching himself a fish? The guy is seriously excited.”

Luna smiled. “Very good. And you were able to do that while still maintaining your shields. Very good indeed. Blair will be overjoyed. We’ll be careful not to touch you, for a while, anyway, until you feel confident you can handle it. There’s no need to rush, of course, but any time you want to wake up, I’m sure your shields will remain as steady. And everyone would love to meet you. Even if Rodney won’t ever tell you so.”

Å 

Executive Officer Leon Vance groaned and reached for yet another headache pill. Ducky was not going to be pleased with him, going through this bottle so fast… but really, this whole situation was worsening the pain in his head… and his butt. That trapped feeling was back with a vengeance, too, as all these angry people crowded around his desk. He touched his comm to put in a call to the JAG, AJ Chegwidden. He was done trying to get these idiots to listen. 

“And I’m telling you, *Sir*, that I had no choice! They invoked the Nineteenth Clause of the Novelle Charter. You know? One of the treaties and agreements you said you would uphold in your Inaugural address, five days ago? DiNozzo Junior surfaced as a shaman. They were well within their rights to take him for training.”

“Junior *can’t* be a shaman!” Anthony DiNozzo Senior insisted, stubbornly repeating himself for the tenth damn time. “He’s brain-damaged!”

“You’re sure about that?” Leon countered.

“Of course I am! He’s always been—”

“It doesn’t matter the state of his brain,” Intel Unit Chief David interrupted, giving Senior a vicious glance. “He is contracted to marry my daughter. Surely our rights in this supersede—“

“They do *not*,” Leon was forced to repeat himself. He took a deep breath, to explain, *again*, just why the Nineteenth superseded every other consideration. 

Then his Captain stood up.

“Enough! I’ve heard enough from all of you. That boy has the strongest Gene of his generation. On that alone, we need him back on the City. Gibbs, you got someone in your squadron who can fly a shuttle?”

“Yes! Finally,” growled the SFD commander. He had been silent through the impromptu meeting, but bristling with ire and impatience, a tangible force in the Command Tower Operations Deck conference room. 

“Then get them up to the Shuttle Bay. David, you and your daughter, Chief Officer DiNozzo, the commander and myself, will go and make clear to the damn Elpers that taking our people like this is not acceptable to us, and we’ll bring that boy home. Clear?”

Leon was actually relieved. It would get these five out of his hair for a little while. Let the Elpers explain the facts of life to his commanding officer, since no one was listening to *him*.

Although, he couldn’t blame any of the five for being so blind about the law. The very fact the DiNozzo kid had the Gene, the one thing that made him an invaluable commodity, was why the Captain had had to ask if Gibbs had a pilot on his staff. Because none of the five on this impromptu mission *did* have a strong enough expression even to get one of their small flying craft out of the Shuttle Bay berths.

Leon remained on the Operations Deck, beside the duty tech on consoles, who called up the monitor on the Shuttle Bay. Together, he and the Ops Tech watched the blunt-nosed shuttle detach from the charging berth and hover slowly then lower to the main staging deck. It landed with a somewhat wobbly *thunk*, then the back hatch lowered to allow the five passengers, and the security team Gibbs had hastily assembled, to board. The pilot was Dorneget, an SFD trainee, and his voice came over the comms, cracking like an adolescent’s.

“Command, this is Shuttle One, ready to depart.”

Leon tapped the back of Chuck, the tech who ran the consoles, to open the Shuttle Bay roof portal, to allow the shuttle to depart the City. With permission granted, and the way cleared, the shuttle lifted and made its shaky way into the sky. Once the portal closed again, blessed silence descended upon the whole of Ops. 

Until Chegwidden arrived, looking about, then screwing up his face like he’d bitten into a lemon. Taking in Leon’s relieved stance, he glowered. 

“They still not listening?”

Leon shook his head. “Nope. They just left to hunt down the *Puddle Jumper* for themselves.”

“And you let them go?”

Leon shrugged. “Captain’s orders.” 

AJ sighed and continued to glower. “That’s not going to fly very far with the Alphas. And when they get back without DiNozzo Junior, it’ll be worse.”

“And what do you think either of us can do about it? We’ve been telling them all the same damn thing since they woke up. They just don’t want to hear it. Let the Elpers try telling them. Or let the DiNozzo boy put them all flat on their backs again.”

Chegwidden sighed, disgruntled, but the man should be used to being ignored by now, after three terms as their elected JAG. Not to mention being a Gene Orphan, the only one in the ranks of the Officer Elite because of his elected post. Problem was, he had trained as an SF and a shuttle pilot, risen to the rank of Squadron Commander, and was used to command, and having his orders obeyed. His authority as JAG was not always enough to get more than a condescending nod from any of the Officer cadre. With a frustrated huff, Chegwidden turned his back and stalked out to the nearest transport cabinet, back to his offices and a job he could actually do.

Leon stared down at the empty space of Staging, and the big round stone circle, decorated with symbols no one could read, which most called the *Astrea Porta*, for what reason, no one remembered.

Leon shook his head. Yeah, they needed more strong Genes, but… Leon didn’t think this particular case was going to end in their favor. And soon enough, it would be a moot point anyway. If you couldn’t power an ancient City, you sure as hell didn’t need the Gene to control it. He wondered why that shocking, but obvious, fact had still not occurred to anyone else.

He left to find his own office, and another bottle of headache remedy.

Å 

Gibbs and Eli David were well aware that locating the Carib sailing vessel *Puddle Jumper* was a hit-or-miss proposition at the best of times. No one knew why the ship, which they *knew* was engaged in smuggling, although they couldn’t prove it, sometimes dropped off the shuttle scanners, and even the City’s formidable planetary sensor arrays, but it did. 

Not today, though, luckily enough. Although the navigation path the sailing ship was taking wasn’t hard to guess, in any event. They would be making north-west, through an expanse of the world-wide Ocean called Hathor’s Sea, after the oldest of the goa’uld queens whose territory it was, a stretch that was north of the equator and east of the northern continent. Their goal would be Cheyenne, capitol and main harbor for the SGC Province.

The Dorneget kid might not be shit-hot as a pilot, but even he could find west with the sun lowering right in front of them. So it took very little time before they were hovering over the *Puddle Jumper*, and, over the shuttle public address system, giving the Elper crew the order to heave to, by the order of the Captain.

The shuttle hovered just off the port bow of the ship, lowered its exit ramp, which was able to extend to the gunwale rail. The Lanteans could wish the boarding was a little… more secure… but the pilot was having difficulty keeping in synch with a moving vessel, still drifting, even with the sails furled, and the waves beneath her rocking the whole thing. But it wasn’t like there was any port in sight for them to tie up to. So Dorneget, with sweat on his brow and dampening the back of his uniform collar, could only bite the inside of his cheek, and hope for the best.

The decks of the *Puddle Jumper* were already a little crowded, with all the passengers, not to mention the cargo the ship had taken on at Atlantis. Boxes, bales and kegs were piled here and there, tied down or secured under nets, overflow that would not fit in the already-crammed hold. It was a working ship, after all, and couldn’t afford to make any voyage without carrying cargo. They had offloaded quite a shipment of food-stuffs to the Market Pier when they arrived for the command performance of an Inauguration. 

Captain John Sheppard was front and center, by the wheel on the quarterdeck. 

“Ahoy, Captain Kinsey. You have permission to board. Not that you asked… Welcome aboard *my* ship, the *Puddle Jumper*. What brings you all the way out here?”

Kinsey ignored the smirks and sneers of these damn Elpers. “You took something that belongs to Atlantis. I’ve come to get it back. Where is Anthony DiNozzo Junior?”

“Yeah, we’ve talked about this. Alpha Sentinel O’Neill, Alpha Shaman McKay and Alpha Sentinel Potter are going to talk this over with you. In the ward-room. I’m sure you’ll appreciate the privacy for this. But I warn you, there’s limited space and seats down there, so you might want to leave some of your escort behind?”

The cordial smile on the man’s handsome face might have caused the Lantean contingent some concern… it certainly should have warned them they might not be getting their own way so easily. But Kinsey gave back a shark-like smile of his own. 

“What, not the Alpha Primes? Ellison and Sandburg not willing to take the lead?”

Ellison was leaning against the main mast, but Sandburg was not in sight. 

“No need,” the Alpha Sentinel Prime shrugged. “Jack, McKay and Potter all know the law as well as I do. I get riled, and I just might start to throw punches. Not helpful in this situation. And Blair… he’s busy.”

Oh yeah, he was busy, because as soon as they were alerted to the in-coming shuttle, the DiNozzo kid had a panic attack and melt down of epic proportions, and it was taking Blair and most of the other shamans to calm him down. McKay, not being all that great at calm himself, was bowing out of that duty in this case, and at least one shaman ought to be facing down the Lanteans, and keeping the sentinels from getting as ‘directly involved’ in throwing these bastards out as Jim wanted to be. Not that Jim thought McKay would be much good at that kind of thing, either… more supportive, probably. But then, that was going to be the high-and-mighty Captain’s look-out.

“Very well, then!” Kinsey declared, thinking that if the Primes were unwilling to face him, he had already won. Confidence, entitlement, blatant arrogance even, was too much a part of his character to allow him to anticipate anything but victory, no matter the battle. So, trailed by Gibbs, both Davids and DiNozzo Senior, they trooped down after Captain Sheppard to the aft ward-room. The ship captain bowed with a mocking smile as they passed him, then saluted and shut the door, returning to his duties on the quarterdeck.

There were portals off the ward-room at the stern, looking out over the sea, large square windows made of diamond-shaped leaded glass, allowing light into the cabin. In the center was a table, with chairs ranged around. O’Neill sat at the head, back to the light so he was difficult to see, with McKay on one side and Potter on the other.

Only now did Kinsey remember it was these same three who had come to claim Spencer Reid, three years ago, when the spindly young man had surfaced as a shaman. But Reid had been a scientist, a Gene Orphan, not a true Lantean… it had been easy to tell himself that it was no loss, tossing a damn Elper-born geek back to his kindred. In that case, following the law was no mark of failure on his part. That’s how he had spun the incident to the Lanteans, and although there were some protests from the Science Division, who claimed his intellect was too great to lose, Kinsey had ignored that fact. Surely they had enough egg-heads around the place. If they could get along without McKay, after all, it should be all the easier to get along without an Elper-born trainee.

Losing Reid? No great problem. Losing DiNozzo Junior? Not going to happen. Particularly not with Gibbs, Eli David and Senior all so personally invested in that walking Gene.

Kinsey grabbed the seat directly across from O’Neill, and let his companions settle where they would. Only the David daughter remained standing, leaning by the ward-room door, taking a knife from somewhere on her person to play with the narrow blade and smirk with a predatory smile at the Elpers.

O’Neill gave them all a careful study, clearly unimpressed. Potter’s face was seen in silhouette against the portals, his Magical kaleidoscope eyes glittering in shadow, expression hooded and inexpressive. McKay placed a tablet before him… a tablet! Atlantis tech! But then, he was Lantean… had been Lantean… so he must have taken his own personal device with him when he surfaced as shaman and turned traitor to the City. Kinsey had clashed with McKay for years before that, a constant pain in his backside. The man had been Chief Science Officer before he surfaced, and fought any number of initiatives Kinsey had wanted and insisted upon… and, unaccountably, more often than not got his own way in the end. It was almost as if the City… sided with him. Which was clearly nonsense. There was a superstition, persistent down through the ages, that the advanced and alien City was actually sentient. Which was also clearly nonsense.

Kinsey scowled at the former CSO, then focused exclusively on O’Neill, clearly the Elper leader.

“You must turn over DiNozzo Junior, O’Neill. We’re taking him back to the City. Vance had no right to yield him up to you in the first place. Not only is he brain-damaged and ruled incompetent, the legal ward of his father, DiNozzo Senior here, but he is contracted to wed Intel Officer Ziva David, a commitment that should have been consummated before he went anywhere, for any reason. And he’s a Gene carrier. He falls under the Gene Mandate.”

O’Neill glanced at McKay, signaling him to reply with a nod. The former CSO consulted his tablet and scrolling to the relevant documentation he had obviously queued up, read off the screen. 

“The Gene Mandate, as you call it, is part of the Fifth Clause to the Novelle Charter. It provides for the assignment of those with the Atlantis Technology Activation Gene to the City, when detected in any citizen from school age up. However, the provisions of the Nineteenth Clause clearly state that it supersedes all previous clauses and laws. Making sure any new sentinel or shaman is adequately trained and supported to manage their gifts is of the highest priority, vital to the survival of every inhabitant of Novelle, as recognized even by the Lantean leadership over the years. As for any contracts entered into, either by DiNozzo Junior himself or…” McKay sneered at Senior, “his legal proxy, those were rendered void the moment he manifested as a sentinel or surfaced as a shaman. In his case, shaman. 

“Moreover, if he has a legal guardian, that guardian must be a sentinel or shaman themselves, or be replaced by one who is. Since Mr. DiNozzo Senior is neither a sentinel nor a shaman, his responsibilities for DiNozzo Junior are at an end. Blair Sandburg has agreed to be DiNozzo Junior’s interim guardian, as is his right as Alpha Shaman Prime, unless or until DiNozzo Junior is deemed fit to choose his own.

“So, does that cover your claims on DiNozzo Junior? Guardianship, pre-existing contracts, Gene? I do believe it does. Anything else, Captain Kinsey?” 

It seemed all of the Lanteans had objections to put forth, but Gibbs was the most voluble. He vaulted to his feet, his chair knocking back against the bulkhead, as he slammed his fists on the table. “You can’t have him! He’s mine!” the commander shouted over the other protests.

Potter made a pass in the air with a wooden stick no one had noticed in his hand. And abrupt silence fell. Gibbs and the others clutched at their throats, alarmed. 

“It’s a silencing spell,” Potter explained calmly. “I will release it when it is your turn to speak. In this case, I believe Commander Gibbs has made a claim? If I permit you to speak, Commander, will you be able to justify this claim, either legally or morally?”

None of the other Lanteans would look at him. And Gibbs himself… he glanced at Senior, who was going red in the face. Frustrated, furious, Gibbs was forced to shake his head, no, and slowly subside back into his chair, helpfully up-righted for him by Ziva. With a startled gasp, he felt the lock on his vocal chords loosen. He swallowed, but did not venture to speak.

O’Neill scowled at them all. “Let’s be clear here. Whatever mental state you think DiNozzo Junior is in, he is a shaman. The Nineteenth Clause *guarantees* that he be allowed to train for his abilities, before *any* other consideration or responsibility. Why? That should be clear to all five of you. Because a shaman’s powers are *dangerous* if not trained. Not just to himself, but to everyone around him. In one moment, this ‘brain-damaged’ kid laid all five of you flat on your backs, and it’s only now, days later, that you’re all on your feet again, ready to raise hell. Do you really want to risk getting anywhere near him again, until he has better control of himself? Really? It would be irresponsible of us not to train him up, as much as we can, and he is able. 

“For crying out loud, have we not had this very conversation before? Twice in the past five years? Do we really need to have it again? The kid is a shaman. He ceased to be your responsibility, your concern, the moment he surfaced. At that moment, he became ours. The law allows for this. Specifies all the terms and conditions. None of this should be a surprise, none of this should be unknown to any of you.”

Potter spoke softly, “Particularly to you, Captain Kinsey. I know you have failed to sign off on the Nineteenth Clause, or the Eighteenth or Twenty-First, for that matter, since you first were elected Captain of Atlantis. I don’t know why you have been dragging your feet, but I hope you realize… simply not signing does not invalidate those clauses in any way. Your signature is not required to ratify those laws. All your signature would do is acknowledge that you have read, and understood, those provisions, and the penalties attached for non-compliance.

“Among us Elpers, study of the Novelle Charter, and its Twenty-Nine Clauses, is part of every school child’s curriculum. I have no idea if you teach it on Atlantis or not. Do you even know the laws you have sworn, as Captain, to uphold and defend?”

At a pass of his wand, and a convulsive swallow from the fulminating Captain, he grudgingly admitted, “Yes. We learn the Charter, same as you.”

“And the history, the background of it? Do you learn that as well? For instance, the Nineteenth Clause, in particular, came about in answer to a desperate need to have sentinel and shaman pairs trained and ready to defend the populations, not just of the provinces, but of the City, too. The sentinels, whose ingrained, instinctive priorities are to protect the Tribe, and protect the Shaman or Guide. Because, in order to function at their highest levels, a sentinel *needs* a guide, fully trained, someone able to buffer them, focus their senses to their maximum degree, without danger of over-whelm or zoning. And history has shown us, over and over again, that our first, best defence against many threats, but especially the ‘Goa’uld Scourge’ as you called it in your own recent speech, are the sentinel-guide pairs. 

“They are vital to all of us, Captain. *All* of us. We need every single one, trained to the utmost degree, functional and ready to fight. It’s a matter of basic survival, life and death for every single one of us. And for someone of DiNozzo’s demonstrated strength and power? An Alpha Shaman? How much more vital is it that he be able to control his abilities? How much more necessary that he be able to put that power to the good of the Tribe? That’s why the Nineteenth Clause was written and ratified in the first place. It would never have been made law at all, unless both settlers and Lanteans agreed to it. Correct?”

“Correct,” the Captain bit out, reluctant, grudging even that one word.

“And the penalties for refusing to obey the law? You are taught this too, even if you haven’t signed off that you’ve read and understood this particular clause?”

The Lanteans had stilled, most spell-silenced, so that the creaking of the wooden boards and the lines in the ship’s rigging echoed loud in the below-decks cabin, as did the slap of the waves against the wooden hull.

McKay smirked. “Oh, we *all* know those. There was a Captain, over a hundred years ago, who decided his authority was stronger than the law. *This* law. Captain Sumner, wasn’t it, Captain Kinsey? I think he was up to three sentinels manifested and four shamans surfaced, all untrained, all with the Gene, that he held onto like grim death, right? And grim death it was, too, because when the goa’uld swarmed over the City piers, although the sentinels and shamans stepped forward to lead the battle against the invasion, they weren’t trained, didn’t know what the hell they were doing, and were all taken over. Host to the damn parasites. And with parasites taking them over, they killed over a hundred of the Crew before they were finally put down, and the Elper Guardians were able to come in and clean out the rest of the infestation.”

O’Neill leaned back in his chair and smirked. “Sumner… he was taken over himself, wasn’t he? And even when the Alpha Shaman Prime released him, his own Officer Elite hung him from the top of the Atlantis Central Command Tower, and when he finally decayed enough to start dripping bits of limbs, they dropped him into the Sea?”

McKay smiled wide, blue eyes sharp with satisfaction. “Atlantis still has the video, of both the Goa’uld invasion, and the aftermath. I *know* it’s one of the ones shown to every new Captain on their Inauguration Day. But maybe the DiNozzo kid had already laid you flat before you could view it again, Captain Kinsey?”

Potter stared at the Captain, held his glare until the Captain dropped his attention to the scarred wooden table surface where his fists were tight-clenched.

“Of course,” Potter offered softly then, with a polite smile. “If you truly wish to challenge or nullify the Nineteenth Clause, you always have the option of invoking the Twenty-Ninth Clause of the Charter. Which, as you know, states that ‘If both Lantean leadership and the Colonial Council of the Seven Provinces, unanimously desire to contest or renegotiate any clause, the entire Charter is rendered null and void, and the whole must be re-written and ratified by all parties to be valid’. I can pretty much guarantee you that the Council of Seven Provinces will be only *too* happy to agree unanimously to suspend the entire Charter. We’ve had a re-written version prepared and waiting for years. I know we gave your Judge Advocate General, AJ Chegwidden, a copy, and keep him updated on amendments we wish to make. We can make a copy of it available to you as well for your review, if you like? Or you can ask your JAG to brief you. And, just so you know, the very first clauses we will demand be deleted are Clause One, The Control of Markets, and Clause Five, the Gene Mandate.” 

There was silence from the other side of the table at this. While the Elpers were not officially supposed to know about the power problems on the City, there was no doubt in the minds of the Lanteans that they were well aware. It had been something CSO McKay had ranted over on a daily basis, before his emergence as shaman. Numerous contingency reports had been written under the name Reid for evacuation procedures, should they become necessary as the City lost power. So, yes, these people all knew the City was swiftly running out of the energy that maintained and supported the Lantean power base on Novelle. This would be the worst possible time for them to allow the Charter to be renegotiated. There had rarely been a time in the past when there was any chance of the Lanteans agreeing to such a thing. Even now, the custody of one brain-damaged shaman, no matter how strong his Gene, was not worth such a risk. 

“There is an old, old saying, Captain Kinsey,” Potter remarked. “Those who will not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. The goa’uld grow stronger and more vicious with each spawning, more and more of them born remembering what it is to take a human or Magical host, and willing to settle for nothing less. The incursions and invasions at hosting season are becoming more violent, more coordinated, more successful. Some of them have acquired the ability to remain with a host, and resist the spawning urge, to abandon their natural reproductive cycle. We’ve told you this. We’ve shown you the reports. Why do you think the numbers of larvae gathering around Atlantis at hosting season have increased year after year? They know the power of the City, and they want it for themselves. 

“You think you can keep them from over-running you indefinitely? And when you need assistance, where are you going to get it, if not from us? You wonder why no sentinel, shaman or guide, having completed training, is willing to return to the City? It’s because we *all* feel it is intolerable to live there, hamstrung by the foolish and arrogant command of people like yourself and your Officer Elite. Our instinct to protect the Tribe demands we serve in the provinces. But, unlike yourselves, you can be assured that if you call for our assistance, we will answer. Without question, without hesitation. As is our duty and spelled out in the Charter. Can you risk violating the law in this case? When, very soon now, you will need any help we can provide… including DiNozzo Junior’s?”

“You may have won an election, Captain,” O’Neill declared, “but that doesn’t make you immune to the law. There must be plenty of rivals for the Captaincy, just waiting for you to slip up, so they can take over. You defy the law, ignore your oaths of service, and that’s leverage you’re handing to them, as a gift. But go ahead. Try it. Or invoke Clause Twenty-Nine. But, see, there’s one more thing you’re forgetting.

“It’s one thing to take custody of a shaman, against their will. But holding them? Yeah, that’s a recipe for disaster. Because the next time you make a move on that kid, it won’t be just a mild case of psychic shock you have to deal with.”

That, more than anything, seemed to get through the thick skin of the Lanteans. Each of them had reason to fear what the DiNozzo boy might do to them next… 

DiNozzo Senior was suddenly reminded of a screaming eight-year-old, incandescent with rage, because he had seen his beloved (but drunken and weak-willed) mother pushed off a balcony to her death. The pure hatred in those green eyes had only grown as he beat the kid… until those accusing eyes, so like his mother’s, closed entirely. The last time he had seen anything but blank vagueness in them. Until that moment on the podium on the South Pier. When the hatred was suddenly back. And the sense, fleeting, but sticking to him like mud, that there was more, much more, where that came from, if he ever came near again.

Gibbs, for months overwhelmed by his lust for a pretty face in a gorgeous body, had never given thought to what might lie behind the pretty, but blank green eyes. Night after night, those mesmerizing emerald eyes had briefly lit on him, coming in the door, and the briefest flash of emotions, fear, hatred, hopelessness, resignation, and intelligence, had fled like shadows, leaving only the blankness behind. As if the soul behind them had left the building. It had never troubled him before. He didn’t need, didn’t want, reactions from the boy. Just submission. But what if… what if… That psychic punch to his face had been anything but submissive. It had been a warning. Back off, or else. 

Ziva had not told anyone what she had experienced, in the instant she touched her intended husband, and that psychic wave had hit her square in the chest. Flashing past her eyes in vivid memories were every violent crime she had ever committed, every bad act, every sin, every guilty secret… everything laid bare… and she wondered… had her proposed fiancé seen it all too?

Her throat suddenly loosened, she ventured to her father’s shoulder. “We don’t need him, papa. We can have what we desire in a much less… contentious way. Chief Officer DiNozzo owes us this much. I am sure he can supply us with other means to achieve our goals.”

So much was true enough, and as Eli David challenged the Chief Procurement Officer with a look, DiNozzo Senior nodded. And, in fact, the man brightened with the thought that, yes, even without his waste-of-space son in his hands, he still had a corner on the market of guaranteed Gene-producing sperm. 

Realising his support for claiming DiNozzo Junior had dried up (Gibbs would just have to swallow it like a man), Kinsey backed off. He was too much the politician to betray how relieved he was. It would be galling to return to the City and face Leon’s raised eyebrow, saying better than words, ‘I told you so’, much less that of that damned Gene Orphan, Chegwidden. But he could deal with that. He would find some way to spin it all to his benefit… the younger DiNozzo was brain-damaged, after all, and in such diminished capacity but with shaman powers, clearly a threat to everyone around him. Better the Elpers were stuck with him, responsible for controlling the damned loose cannon. 

Å 

“There, Tony. You see? They’ve gone,” Luna soothed the new shaman, cowering away in the blue jungle, still shuddering at just the idea of any of those five being anywhere close to him. 

It had quickly become clear that, of all of them, Tony dealt best with Luna. Her slightly vague, distracted but gentle soul spoke to him, eased him… reminded, in some little way, of his long-lost mother.

“Come out, now, Tony. It’s time you met us all. The Lanteans are gone.”

Å


	5. Chapter 5: "Are there any more of the little suckers in there?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My description of Cheyenne is modeled after St. John’s, Newfoundland (a port city on the east coast of Canada). The harbor and Signal Hills are awesome.

Å 

The young man spent most of his time hiding out in the captain’s cabin that Sheppard had turned over for him, but the other shamans did their best to pull him out into the free air for part of each day. Even there, he kept himself apart, on deck at the bowsprit, face into the wind, eyes closed, a silent presence they all felt like a static tingling, raising hairs and goose bumps on their skin, but remote, isolated. The shamans were allowed close to him, but he shied at any others. The crew of the *Puddle Jumper* took it all in stride… it was Guardian business, as far as they were concerned, and they never did mess with passengers, too busy with their regular duties. 

The sentinels seemed content to leave it all in their partners’ hands as well, dealing with the newest shaman among them. But O’Neill was beginning to feel a bit antsy about the kid. He looked to his bond-mate, questions in his brown eyes. 

“I’m willing to give the kid the benefit of the doubt here, Daniel, but… what’s his deal, anyway? Why so stand-offish?”

Daniel sighed. “Trying to do a risk-assessment, Jack?”

“Exactly. And I’ve got nothing to work with here. Help me out, will ya?”

“Okay. First of all, *not* brain-damaged. At all.”

“Well, ye-ah. I got that much already.”

“Okay. So, when he was eight years old, he saw his mother murdered by his father. Thrown off one of the Atlantis Tower balconies. Senior claimed she was drunk and tripped, just an accident, but it was deliberate murder.”

Jack winced. Daniel had been eight when his parents had been murdered by the goa’uld, right in front of him. They had been Lantean historians, part of a team sent out to the desert wastes in the all-but-empty interior of the northern continent to check out some ruins found there. The camp had been over-run by goa’uld-possessed werogs, wolf-like predators, and their SFD protection detail had barely been able to drag the screaming little boy away to safety in time. Adult historian Daniel still had nightmares. 

“Okay… that’s bad.”

“Yes, it is. Then when he tried to protest, to tell someone, Senior beat him. Not the first time, not the last, but the worst. Young eight-year-old Tony was left for dead on the floor of his quarters. He survived, obviously, but when he woke up, in order to save himself, he pretended to be deaf, dumb and blind to everything around him. Just so his father would leave him alone. It mostly worked. Mostly. But that’s where Senior got the idea he was brain-dead. It was a role the boy was stuck in thereafter, in self-defense.” 

Jack clenched his teeth against the sudden swell of fury. How could a father… he was still haunted by memories of his own son, Charlie… he would give *anything* to have his kid back… 

“Okay.” He swallowed, and got himself in check again. “Gotcha.”

“So, for the next ten years, he didn’t speak to *anyone*. Except, apparently, the City. She kept him entertained, taught him, opened her databases to him, took him to abandoned parts of the City for exercise and play without anyone on the City being any the wiser… but she was his *only* sentient contact. As far as his family knew, he was kept in his room the whole time. His succession of step-mothers barely realized he was even there. His father rarely bothered to visit him, and once he was sexually mature, only allowed med techs into his room to… ‘milk’ him, I guess you would say, for sperm.”

“Ewww…”

“Then when he turned eighteen, Senior started contracting short-term marriages for him. One every year or two for the next seven years. According to Luna, those marriages weren’t so different from his previous life. He was kept in a room and ignored, until his wives came to visit, briefly, to get what they had signed on for. And out of self-defense, again, he kept up that brain-dead act. So, basically, he was still isolated from everyone. Some of his wives tried to talk to him, but what was he supposed to say? ‘Are you done yet’?”

“And again I say… Ewww. And that’s not even counting whatever the hell Commander Gibbs had going on with him. Okay, I get it. He’s like a potted plant sitting in a sunny window. Never had a meaningful relationship with anyone but an alien city.”

“Poor socialization, yes. Remember what happened last year, when we tried to build a wolf-pack from the home-world forest eco-system, out of embryos we had in stasis?”

Jack winced, holding up his hands. “Okay, okay, I get it. Instinct can only take any life form so far… even wolves have to be taught how to hunt, and interact with their own kind. That’s why we have to start with the culling buffers we have of grown animals. And that’s why the Hogwarts folks have been more successful re-establishing creatures from their home planet. Those things all came out of Scamander Cases, fully grown, from already-complete ecosystems. Got it. So he may have instincts for how to interact, and he’s had the book-version from the Atlantis database libraries, but… no practical experience.”

“That’s about it. It’s going to take him time, Jack. Being a shaman may help… he doesn’t seem to have the same problem communicating and interacting when we’re on the Spirit Plane. Maybe because he feels more secure there. But that’s just a guess on my part. It could simply be that his last physical touch, with the David woman, was violently traumatic all on its own, and he’s afraid to touch *anyone* again.”

“It’s gonna make it tough for him to find a sentinel, too, isn’t it?”

“If he won’t let anyone anywhere near him, but particularly alpha-personality military-trained people, like Gibbs or the David horror? Oh yeah. I’d say so.”

“That why he’s giving the LA sentinel the cold shoulder? Eppes is a high-level unbonded sentinel, and he’s… interested. I mean, *interested*. Which would be the best solution to a lot of issues, since they’ve been without a Guardian Alpha pair since Sateda… for over a decade, now.”

“We’ll just have to see. You don’t push a rape victim straight into a new sexual situation… not if you want them to heal, and keep them sane. And whatever else it was, the thing with Gibbs was rape, Jack.”

“Yeah. Yeah… I get that.”

Å 

They tried not to leave him alone, even as he slept. He awoke to nightmares too often. Some were his own experiences, but an unnerving number of them were memories that weren’t his own. Gibbs was a man haunted by far too many extreme personal losses, and Ziva David… that woman’s mind had been… a hell all of its own. 

So he was used to waking up with some soothing presence nearby. At least it didn’t tug on his horror of waking with one of his wives, or Gibbs, lying too close for comfort. 

This time when he rolled over, it was Daniel Jackson sitting in the chair by his bunk, with a big, heavy, leather-bound book on his lap. He paged through at some speed… nowhere near as fast as the Reid kid or even McKay went through books, and with a gentle and appreciative reverence in his handling of the aged paper. But still, faster than a Lantean tablet paging function would normally allow. 

Tony watched him for a while… the quiet was calm, comforting. At one point he lifted himself enough to see if he could read over Daniel’s shoulder, but the script wasn’t anything that made sense to him. And he thought he had seen all the dialects from the City database.

“It’s a lost language, in its written form anyway. We don’t even have a name for it,” Daniel answered the unasked question softly. “This book came from the home-world, so it’s, at a guess, maybe five hundred years old. This is a re-print, of course, not the original. That’s safely tucked away in a stasis chest with our other home-world artifacts, for safe keeping. This one’s a zoology text-book, of sorts. It describes various eco-systems, and the flora and fauna to be found there, their interactions, dependencies… that sort of thing. The Hogwarts scholars were able to translate it for us, using one of their spells. It was pretty invaluable when we first landed on Novelle.”

Daniel tipped the book so Tony could see the diagrams sketched on one page. There was a photo of a coyote, with a desert background, full of sand and cacti. 

“Coyotes are from the home-world.”

“Most spirit guides are manifestations of home-world animals, yes. Some we managed to re-establish here, some… we didn’t. But then, Novelle was terra-formed even before we arrived. It already had fully-entrenched eco-systems, for desert, rain forest, arboreal forest, prairie, alpine, marsh, tundra… Trees, plants, insects, birds, fish, reptiles… all sorts of flora and fauna, some of which were amazingly similar to those in this book.” 

“How can that be?”

“Well… I have this theory… that the advanced people who built Atlantis were explorers, travelling all over the galaxy, and that they terra-formed, and colonized, a lot of worlds. Maybe even our home-world… maybe even the world the Magicals came from. They’ve certainly been here, in the distant past. Studies from the Atlantis databanks have identified three entirely separate classes of organic life on Novelle. One the Lantean scientists are pretty sure are truly indigenous to Novelle, the original life forms. The goa’uld are part of that pre-existing life-web, as are a lot of the carnivorous plants that are the bane of our existence. The second class was also already here when we Landed, enough like plants and creatures we brought with us in our stasis storage and culling buffers, or Magicals brought in their Scamander Cases, that there’s a strong evolutionary link there. The third are newer forms of those same plants and animals, diverging from the main lines over time. There are more of those at Hogwarts: dragons, phoenixes, unicorns, all manner of magical creatures, but we have some too. Mostly domesticated breeds we brought with us. Dogs and cats, cattle, horses, pigs, sheep and goats… that kind of thing.

“Oddly enough, we find the same kind of classes with the technology we have. There’s the City Builder tech, Atlantis herself and all the devices that require a Gene to initiate, or even just operate, like the shuttles and the life-sign detectors. Then there’s the stuff we brought from the home-worlds… Magical wands, most of the basic tools we colonists were given, anything outlined in these books… The third class… there are a few odds and ends that don’t fall into either category. The main one being the culling buffers. They’re different from the Atlantis beaming tech and transport cabinets, or the stasis fields, and nothing like the Scamander Cases. They seem to be designed to capture large numbers of living organisms, de-materialize them and hold them in its buffers until we choose to re-materialize them. Why? Who knows. Where did we get them? Unknown to us at this time. But handy when we needed to evacuate our home-world so suddenly. There are a few other things… mostly different kinds of energy weapons, like the zats or stun guns… 

“But, the City Builder tech… we’ve found some of it here, in ruins, all over Novelle. 

“Oh yes, the City Builders were here at one time, long, long ago. There used to be a fairly large settlement in the interior of the northern continent, north west of Cheyenne. I found a… structure in the interior of Abydos island, hidden in the desert sands… a pyramid. No idea what it was built for, and I was unable to find a way inside… if there even is an interior to it. Maybe it’s just solid stone, a marker of some kind. There’s certainly a lot of evidence they left behind in the caverns of Hellmouth, in the southern continent. We think they had their own mining and quarry works there, and it’s the largest presence we’ve found of them so far. A lot of shafts were already there when we Landed, made with tech and tools we can’t begin to imagine. And Rodney found energy emissions, from a deep trench in the Central Basin, that he says match Atlantis. There’s apparently a hydro or thermal power generator down there, drawing from volcanic vents on the ocean floor.”

Tony frowned. “So… they were here. But they’re gone now?”

“For some time, yes. Their tech is amazingly resistant to deterioration. But still… millions of years… some of it’s been buried, under sand-storms, floods, fires, volcanoes, mountain slides, earthquakes… You must know, even the stuff we have on Atlantis, a lot of their devices are as mysterious now as they ever were. Not to mention dangerous.”

Tony nodded. It didn’t happen so much anymore, with so much of the City shut down, locked up and abandoned, off-limits to everyone for power conservation reasons. But there used to be a lot of lives lost, every time some enterprising scientist found a new lab room, or a new tower or basement was cleared for habitation and use. The protocols set in place from before the Exodus, for entering any new structure or room on the City, were still enforced, and extremely stringent. During the Exodus, it was the reason, or excuse, used to justify not allowing any but crew to live on the City.

“One of those mysterious items sits on the lower Ops floor of the Central Command Tower of Atlantis. The *Astrea Porta*, it’s called. Which, from translations I’ve been able to piece together, means ‘Stargate’.”

Tony frowned. “Stargate? Like… Stargate Commune?”

Daniel smiled, nodding. “Yes, exactly like. It’s a big round ring of pure processed naquadah, a kind of crystalline stone, with unidentified markings around the rim. Rodney says there’s a whole control console devoted to the thing, but it’s never been turned on. The power links were all cut and pulled out long ago, along with some of its control crystals, with laws written to prevent anyone hooking them up again. And there’s a… superstition, I’d call it, to keep people well away from it. It’s even marked on the floor, what they call the ‘splash zone’. The only live thing about it is the shield it has clamped over it. To *keep* it turned off. And when some unknown artifact is that sealed and buried, it’s generally for a very good reason.”

Tony nodded slowly. Did he want to know more about this stargate thing? Probably not. He glanced back at Daniel’s lap.

“So… the book?”

“I’m a scholar, a historian. I’m studying what I can of the bits and pieces of our past we’ve preserved, to try and reconstruct our history. Where we came from. How we got here. What we’ve left behind that we’ve lost, and might want back. What it’s going to take for us to survive in the future. We’ve obviously done it before, if only by the skin of our teeth, and I have no doubt that we’ll need to do it again. I was actually thinking you might be able to help me with that. When you’re ready.”

“Me!” Tony was startled. 

“Well, yes. You’re kind of unique, you know. Maybe because of the strength of your Gene, maybe some other reason, but the City talks to you. She talks to all the strong Gene carriers, of course, but with you… she opens doors for you. She shows you parts of her database no one else has ever seen… not that we know of, anyway. All you have to do is ask her for something, and she hands it to you. Believe me, that’s rare. I hesitate to suggest she feels like a mother to you, but… there is some indication that she has an emotional connection with you, and a deep concern for your well-being.”

Tony closed his eyes and rolled away from the shaman’s too-intent blue eyes. “Fat lot of good it’s ever done me.”

“Tony. She’s an AI. As I understand it, she’s got programming that limits what she can, and cannot, do. And she’s a machine. She may have an encyclopedia on how biology works, but does she truly understand it? She probably thinks procreation is an advantage. I have no doubt she wants, and welcomes, more of your offspring. She has volumes telling her that men have sexual needs that need to be addressed for health. Just like she knew that immature humans needed places to run and shout and play to develop properly. She’s responded to whatever immediate needs of yours she recognizes… And now she’s placed you in our care, and asked we protect you, as she could not. I think that’s amazing. Expecting more of her isn’t… reasonable.”

With a sigh, Tony shifted to his back, unwilling to face the man, but not shutting him out, either.

“Okay. I get it. Sooo… you want me to talk to her. Get her to open up. And ask her… what?”

Daniel shrugged. “Whatever you want to know, for now. But maybe, later, when you feel more comfortable about it, when you’re ready… you can ask her about the Wraith.”

A shudder went down Tony’s back. “The Wraith…? I thought… I thought they were just a myth. A horror story, like vampires and werewolves and ghosts and such.”

“Maybe… maybe not. I’m thinking not, because it’s not just humans who have this legend. The Magicals call them the Dementors, but they’re obviously the same thing. We don’t know too much about them… except that they’re an alien race that… eats us. Or maybe sucks out our souls. That part’s not clear from any of the texts I’ve studied. But I suspect their attack is the extinction-level event that took our home-world, and that of the Magicals. I think they’re why we ran, as far and as fast as we could.”

“And you think they’re still out there. Looking for us.”

Daniel shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. But no worries… when you’re ready. We’ve got time.”

Tony studied the man in the gold-rim glasses with the book open on his lap. 

“Do we?”

Daniel smiled thinly. “I think so… I hope so. Because if they do come, I know we’re not ready to face them. Not yet.”

Å

In another day, the dark headland of Stargate Commune appeared on the horizon. Mountains reared up behind it, the white snow-covered peaks looking more like clouds in the distance. The craggy coastline was indented with fjords, plentiful deep coves and natural harbors in among the feet of the mountain range. At the mouth of one of these, two sentry-like mounds formed a gate of sorts on either side of a narrow passage. Upon each hill-top stood a tower of stone, with lights and signal flares ready, and flag-poles to fly warnings and messages. The entrance to the harbor of Cheyenne was well wide enough to allow any ship to pass, to matter how wide in the belly, or deep in the keel. 

Once the goa’uld threat had become clear to the colonists, all sorts of defensive measures had been built in to the various settlement sites. For Cheyenne, that began with the Signal Hills. For starters, a lock system had been built, able to shut off the entire harbor, allowing just one ship in at a time, making a containment pool so that any goa’uld attempting to swim inside could be trapped and killed. 

Once inside the wide harbor, the docking piers stood alone, cut off from the town proper by high stone walls. More warning flags would alert ships, and the people in town could shut themselves up in lock-down behind thick stone walls and shuttered windows, until the danger had passed. 

Upon a leveled-off hill behind and above the town stood the remains of one of the Environmental Life-Support Platforms that had brought the colonists here. The steel and plastic portions of the construction had long rusted out or crumbled into pebbles and shards, to be replaced by stone and wood. Half a mile in diameter, some of the support systems were still operational, maintained, parts replaced: water and sewage systems, some recycling, and the shield, which was now fueled by a naquadah generator. In extreme emergencies, all the people of the port town could gather there, about 10,000 of them, the shield would be raised, to keep them all safe. But its primary function was as a greenhouse for year-round market gardens. Lettuce, tomatoes, potatoes, beets, onions, peas, strawberries and bush berries, garlic, corn, wheat, gourds of all kinds… the ELP still supported them, even two centuries after landing.

And wasn’t it just their luck, Jack grumbled to himself, that they arrived home just in time for a goa’uld hosting blitz?

Å 

“O’Neill!” called out Ronon, one of John Sheppard’s crew, and a sentinel often sent into the crow’s nest for sighting, “Get up here! Cheyenne is flying the red flag!”

“Oh for crying out loud…” Jack growled, hauling himself up the main mast to the observation post. “Yeah… black borders. It’s goa’uld. Damn. Our next hosting cycle isn’t supposed to be for a month.”

Ronon nodded grimly. “They’ve been off for the past year, all over the planet. The damn goa’uld are trying to avoid the countermeasures by coming early, or late. Early is better… takes a parasite longer to control a host when they’re not fully mature enough. Gives us time to get ‘em out.”

Ronon had made himself an expert on the goa’uld. Every Elper knew a lot about their greatest enemy, but Ronon had made a special study of the snakes that had destroyed Sateda, his home village, and killed all his family. 

Sateda had been a remote village in the middle of the Province of Llanuras de los Angeles, on the western spur of the southern continent. The interior was all flat prairie-land on the high mesa, Sateda the trail-head collection centre for the harvests of wheat fields and cattle herds. He had been an almost-too-young militia volunteer when the attack started, and had been driven to a feral drive as his sentinel manifested under the stress. As many of the goa’uld-infested werog packs as attacked, he simply could not get them all. They were a predator form native to Novelle, a kind of cross between a bear and a wolf. Normally they were solitary hunters, kept away from human habitations, but with a goa’uld inside them, they behaved… differently.

His team had been cut off and driven to the outskirts of the village, and one by one, his comrades had fallen to the vicious, ravenous beasts. The LA Guardians arrived finally, with as many militia as they could gather in a hurry, having ridden hard all the way from the capital of Hollywood. But even that wasn’t enough to stave off the hordes of parasite-controlled hosts. The LA Guardians and their militia all fell, too. Call after desperate call to Atlantis for the assistance of the SFD, went unanswered. 

Ronon never stopped fighting, and when his rifle ran out of ammunition, he used a harvesting scythe to cut the beasts to ribbons. His sentinel speed and strength gave him an advantage… allowed him to survive, the last standing after the long, long, bloody night… to find himself alone in the silence and devastation. 

Until the smell of blood brought more of the monsters. They chased him for days… ten-days… months… further and further into the unexplored wilderness beyond the LA settlements… he was lost for a time, then blind with rage… he killed all those who trailed him. And then he began hunting the goa’uld. No matter where they tried to hide from him. They couldn’t evade a sentinel’s senses. 

But one day, he came across one goa’uld in an animal host that was looking for more than a meal. 

Ronon had been ambushed and taken as a host himself. 

It was a mercy that he remembered almost nothing of that time. It was a pain-fogged nightmare, where his conscious mind curled into a fetal ball of misery, a small dark corner of his own mind, howling with fury. Occasionally, the parasite in control of his body made an attempt to invade his memories, or to get him to do something… something his instinct as a sentinel rebelled against, and drove him deeper into the wilderness, well away from other humans. 

It was years before he came across humans again. His parasite had chased a flock of goa’ulded gosraptors down to a spawning river, where he killed the queen, ate her, and found the males, ditching their avian-reptilian hosts, dying in the hundreds, and ate them too. He waited until the few goa’uld larval hatchlings began to swim for the ocean, and trailed them to the shores of Bast’s Sea, killing and eating as many as he could sieve out of the swift-flowing river. 

Only to find Sentinel John Sheppard and Shaman Teyla Emmagan there, with swords in their hands, slashing through the goa’uld salt-water larvae that had come in to the shallows at the river mouth to take part in a feast of hatchlings. 

He would have run, again, but Teyla reached for him, and he froze… John leapt and pinned him to the sand of the beach… and suddenly… he was free. For the first time in years, he was free, and in command of his own body. A slimy eel-like thing was leaking blue gore, and dying on the sand beneath his open mouth. 

He passed out, and slept… truly slept, without nightmares, without dreams, for days. 

When he returned to awareness, it was with the knowledge that everything had changed. He had no family, no village… nothing and no one to return to. And vague phantom memories began to plague him, waking and sleeping… of the monster he had become under the influence of the parasite. And the only relief, the only comfort he could find, was in Teyla’s kaleidoscope color-wheeling eyes. In his dreams, of a hazy blue jungle, he followed a timber wolf to a glade, where a spotted wildcat, an ocelot, purred and curled in his lap, giving him comfort, and respite from the shadows of horrors lurking in the shadowed jungle.

It wasn’t hard to convince Ronon that he should join the *Puddle Jumper* crew. 

But he never gave up his study of the goa’uld. He would kill them wherever and however he could, as long as he lived. And that would work best if he could get into their snakey little heads, and anticipate their every action.

Jack had the greatest respect for Ronon. Almost as great as for his best friend, Teal’c. Who, right now, was in charge of the Cheyenne Militia, and was no doubt leading the charge to kick serious goa’uld butt.

Å 

Captain John ordered the *Puddle Jumper* message flags raised, to tell the Cheyenne defenders that they were incoming with their Alphas. Answering flags gave the clearance to come ahead, but to wait for the outer lock gates to lift. All of the Guardians had assembled and armed themselves with their weapons of choice, and so had the LA sentinel. It was already clear, from the amassed dark shadows flitting through the dark water, that the goa’uld schools were collecting.

Tony followed Alpha Shaman Willow Rosenberg out of the Captain’s cabin. The red-head half-Magical teenager ran to join her sentinel, Buffy Summers. The pair, just kids really, still struck Tony as dangerous and competent. This was definitely not the first action they’d seen. It startled Tony a little, since he had wondered how the young and naïve Willow could possibly stand the pressure and responsibility of being the Alpha for her province. Well, asked and answered. Willow drew a light, but wickedly sharp sword, while Buffy brandished a wooden spear of some kind she called ‘Mister Pointy’.

The Cheyenne lock system was fascinating to watch… goa’uld parasites were shaped like eels or snakes, so the nets to catch them had to be of a fine gage, which inevitably caught larger flotsam as well. The fishermen clustered on shelves above the water line at the mouth of the harbor were all intent and cautious. Metal cages had been permanently fixed to the rocky cliff-face, all with lockable covers. Salutes and waves were sent as the people recognized their Alpha Sentinel on the ship deck. 

“Reynolds! Davis! Sitrep!”

Two men with red arm-bands straightened, and glanced at each other, one nodding to the other to give the briefing, even as he pulled up a net full of squirming larvae, which were immediately dumped in the lidded holding pails with hundreds of others. His companion shouted out, so not only his own commanding Alpha would hear the report, but so would those without sentinel senses.

“Started at dawn, sir! We had the warning from Shaman Harriman, and went to red alert immediately. Teal’c and Carter are in the town, coordinating with Councilors Hammond and Landry. A few got past the lock, but we’ve got most of them contained or held outside the iris. Militia is patrolling with our sentinel-guide pairs. Standard evac of civilians to the Enviro, sir.”

“Any incursions? We got any hosts?”

“Not so far detected, sir. But there’s a shit load of the damn things swarming around the gate.”

O’Neill nodded grimly. “So we saw. Worse than last season.”

“A lot worse, sir, according to our shamans.”

Jack glanced at Daniel, who, grim faced, nodded.

“Well, let’s get these cleared out so we can pass into the inner harbor. Sound good to you?”

“Sir! Yes sir! We could use more shamans here anyway, sir.”

“Well, you got all the alphas of Novelle right here, ready and waiting, Reynolds.”

Beside Tony, Willow Rosenberg gave a little happy “Meep!” and hopped on her feet.

While everyone else supplied themselves with the small-gage nets on long, *very* long handles, and the *Puddle Jumper* crew pulled out similar large metal lidded containers to hang off the sides of the ship, the shamans all congregated in the middle of the main deck, and settled themselves into cross-legged poses. 

Tony blinked, wondering what it all meant.

And then he felt them…

The little fuckers churning up the water were seriously nasty. Rapacious, arrogant, aggressive, with a tunnel-vision focus on just one thing… getting themselves a host. No, not any host, but a human-shaped host! Two legs to walk on, two hands to grip and tear, a mind to command, and the commands would be to conquer, dominate, control… everything. At the back of their ambition was a shining city sitting on the ocean… but these disgruntled creatures were too far away, too weak to reach it, driven away by larger schools of older, higher ranked larvae, although they refused to acknowledge any being superior to their own selves. So here they were, prepared to raid the next-best option… the largest school of humans on the Ocean.

Pretty much the only thing that had spared the colonists so far from being totally overwhelmed by the goa’uld threat, was the fact that every individual larva had its own ‘hosting season’, when instinct told them they were mature, and called them to swarm into schools. If all goa’uld hosted at one time… there would have been *no* adequate defense against their sheer numbers. But it also made planning for each incursion problematic, as there was so much variation. 

Willow turned to Tony, her Magical eyes wheeling swiftly with changing colors, as she smiled. She took his hand and said, “You feel them. Now watch what we do.”

The gentle, soft-hearted teen then closed her eyes… and all the shamans appeared to take ghostly form that separated from their physical bodies, to lean over the sides of the ship. Willow’s shade stared at the water, and he felt her mind sharpen, like the blade she held, tightening in her corporeal grasp. In fact, she imagined a bladed weapon as she leaned over the ship gunwale to stare into the surging dark water inside the lock system. And she slashed with wild and gleeful abandon. Everywhere she struck, the little fuckers squealed and writhed, and floated to the surface, only to be set upon and eaten by their fellows. 

Yeah, the goa’uld were cannibals, in every stage of their life-cycle. 

Daniel Jackson used a metaphorical shovel, scooping masses of larvae out and dumping them in a sieve contraption that he then mashed down. His catch may not have been physically mashed, but they *thought* they were, and so died. Luna Lovegood used her wand, calling out spell after spell of destruction. McKay used a shadowy Lantean energy weapon set to kill. Spencer Reid had what looked for all the world like a hand-gun, and began shooting… every metaphorical bullet hitting one of the larvae in the head, convincing them that they’d been turned into mush. Teyla had her own means, using two baton-shaped sticks to batter at any goa’uld larvae that leapt from the surface of the water. As for the Alpha Shaman Prime, Blair Sandburg, he held up a spirit torch, lit with blue fire, and plunged it into the water, where it seethed with bubbles, but could not be quenched, and the little suckers squealed as if burned to a crisp. 

Tony pondered his own approach as he became aware of the other shamans, each with their own method of dealing with the countless larvae in the water. What weapon was he familiar with?

He separated his spirit self, with his coyote at his side, and approached the rail. Then he stepped over the side, plunging deep into the salt-water pool. 

The larvae felt him there, *saw* him in whatever way their tiny black eyes could, and clearly believed he was real. Real, and stupidly lining up to be a host. And as they came at him in their countless hundreds, he collected himself, focused, and remembered that moment on the podium… and he remembered the five people he hated most in the world, five humans who were every bit as rapacious, arrogant, aggressive, with a tunnel-vision focus on just one thing… as the goa’uld. And right now, just as before, focused entirely on *him*.

He thought he heard it, like a loud boom. He thought he felt it, like a concussion blast from an explosion, rippling though the water, pulsing out from his center. And the entire school of larvae, stunned and helpless, floated to the surface, to be quickly scooped out and deposited in metal containers, lids slapped down and screwed tight.

“Well…” Blair said slowly, “I guess that’s *one* way of doing it…”

As Tony rose from his trance, he looked around at all the faces, staring at him, jaws dropped in shock. 

“Um… did I do something wrong?”

Willow giggled, first in little huffs, then inelegant snorts out of her nose, as if she were trying to restrain herself, then loud, totally hysterical guffaws that one would never guess she could make. And the other shamans soon joined in, rolling on the deck with hilarity. 

“Okay, okay,” O’Neill declared gruffly, “Any of you lot want to get serious here? We’ve still got a major incursion to deal with, and I need to know before we open the inner gate. Are there any more of the little suckers in there?”

Å


	6. Chapter 6: "She's gone. Hathor's... gone."

Å 

The *Puddle Jumper* tied up at the main pier, and an armed and armored squad of militia trotted down stone steps from the barricade wall to meet them, and assist in tying up. No off-loading would be done until the danger was past. Working on the docks was too dangerous during a hosting season. When properly motivated, a goa’uld could leap several feet in the air to reach a potential host. In the lead of the militia was a beautiful but competent and serious woman with short blonde hair, and a huge man with dark skin, sparking Magical eyes, and a scar on his forehead. 

A lot of people had scars on their foreheads, Tony had learned. Harry Potter had one, too. Most of them were evidence of a failed attempt by a goa’uld at taking a host.

“Carter,” Jack O’Neill greeted the woman returning what looked like a formal militia salute, then turning to the big half-Magical. “Teal’c! My man!” Jack greeted gladly, jumping onto the dock and striding up to take his second by the forearm in a shake, then pulling him into a hug and a manly slap on the back that the big man accepted in stoic resignation. “How’s it hangin?”

“It hangs a little too low to the waterline, O’Neill,” Teal’c replied dryly, glancing at the harbor, the surface rather too full of ominous ripples. “Too many parasites managed to get inside the locks before we had them contained. And there are still large numbers outside our defenses.”

“More than we can handle?”

“At this stage, it is difficult to say. More arrive all the time, and too many are inside the harbor for my peace of mind. All it takes is one successful hosting, and…”

“And we’re fighting our own people as well as the little suckers.” Jack winced at just the idea… no one needed to tell him the danger and the horror of that kind of situation. He knew it from personal and painful experience. “Okay. We’re host free at the moment though, correct?”

“Indeed. As far as our shamans can tell.”

“Okay then. Let’s…”

“There is another problematic development, O’Neill,” Teal’c interrupted with a warning glare. “As per protocol, Councilor Hammond at once alerted Atlantis as to the invasion. Unlike other such attacks, this time they are sending us a squadron of shuttles and SFD in support.”

Shooting a quick glance at the DiNozzo kid, Jack blew out a sigh. “Well damn. Commander Gibbs in charge, I suppose?”

Teal’c’s eyes narrowed. “Indeed.” He didn’t bother to ask his alpha how he knew. He would be told, or not, in O’Neill’s own time. 

“Daniel, take DiNozzo to the Enviro. Do a scan while you’re there, just to be sure. But I think we need to keep the kid under wraps, for now.”

“You got it, Jack. Come on, Tony. Let me show you around the town.”

Å 

Daniel and Tony left everyone else on the docks and climbed the stone steps to the town streets. They were cobbled, the buildings built of stone, even the shops with windows of leaded glass…

“Stone and glass… to protect against the goa’uld?”

“Well, that, and the weather. Winter can be pretty brutal here, cold, snow blizzards, freezing rain, wind… stone can protect against pretty much anything, including animal incursions. In the early years after Landing, the goa’uld came in animal hosts, mostly big ugly predators, attacking in large packs.”

The town of Cheyenne had a large central square, a paved plaza with semi-permanent tents set up in a market, now deserted, packed up neatly and tied down. Around the perimeter, were various larger buildings that had imposing facades… civic in purpose. Daniel pointed out the Council House, the Medical Clinic, the Militia HQ and barracks, the School, Library, and Guild Offices. Further up the hill, they came to the fortified and shielded Enviro. At one prominent arch, Daniel touched an ID pad, and gestured Tony to follow him through. 

“The arch has a very small jammer to interrupt the Shield in just this localized section, when turned on. The ID pad is biometric, and my hand-print is recognized. It also has a scanner that looks for naquadah… the goa’uld larvae, and therefore also their hosts, have it… humans and Magicals don’t, unless they’ve been a host in the past... naquadah is a heavy metal that tends to stay in the body, rather than be flushed out. So we have an override for a third party to let them in, but the alarm still sounds.”

While the streets and houses, even the Plaza, had been like a ghost town, the Enviro was bustling with activity and crowds of people. Flat, round, about half a mile in diameter, it had a dome shield over top that was only visible when the occasional leaf or twig brushed against it, sending out a milky shimmer. It was laid out in garden plots with various crops in different stages of growth. Some were mere seedlings, some fully mature plants, sporting fruit or vegetables, some plots were dark rich soil, newly planted or awaiting the plow. In the center there was a cluster of buildings that were no doubt storage sheds for harvests or equipment, or stables for some of the work animals, like the oxen and huge dray horses used to pull farming equipment. But some of the people were busily erecting tents in the few open spaces, laid out in formal lines, in practiced motions.

There had to be almost ten thousand people here! An incredible number, when Atlantis held barely half that. It actually made Tony a bit nervous… he wasn’t used to being out in public like this. And in Daniel’s company, they were attracting a lot of attention. It seemed the other shaman knew almost everyone, too, waving, smiling, greeting, tossing teasing remarks back and forth. But Daniel was forging his way inexorably toward a collection of buildings and larger canvas canopy shelters in the very center of the Enviro. 

At one open-air tent, several older men were clustered around a folding table, reviewing sheaves of paper and folders before them. There was also a communication device on the table, Lantean tech Tony didn’t think the Elpers were supposed to have. Oh, the different province councils were given such devices as a direct means to communicate to Atlantis, to request assistance in case of disaster or goa’uld attack, but this one was showing the holograph of another Elper group, somewhere. They weren’t supposed to know how to tune the things to different base units. There weren’t supposed to *be* other base units. Lantean political domination of Novelle was heavily based on their monopoly, controlling all forms of advanced technology.

Hammond was speaking to the elder with the grey hair and beard, sporting a skull-cap and anti-goa’uld armor in a metal collar around his throat, shown in the display. “I understand, Bra’tac, but we’ve already got some in the inner harbor. Our locks are shut now, and you know they’ll be heading to the rivers if they can’t get in here. Chulak will be their first port of call, and then the other villages up the Colorado River valley. Kelowna, Tolana… and then the river mouths further north, to Nox, Minnesota… you all need to be ready.”

Bra’tac nodded grimly. “They shall not pass, Hammond of Texas. We have the barriers already assembled and are laying them now. I will undertake to warn those up-river, and along the coast.”

“Good. Let us know if you need assistance. Our Guardian Team has just arrived back, so we’re at full strength here and can lend a hand if you need it.”

“We will manage. Your militia is too good to allow many to come our way, but I will call if we find we need help. Did I hear there are Lantean shuttles headed our way?”

Hammond sighed. “Not that they have ever really helped us in the past… although Commander Gibbs is leading this squadron, and he has no love of the goa’uld. I’m endeavoring to keep good thoughts. Good luck to you, Bra’tac. To all of us.”

The transmission cut off, and Hammond turned with an honest smile for the Alpha Shaman. 

“Alpha Shaman Jackson. Welcome back, son.”

Tony could feel the warmth and sincerity of the man, as well as the answering warmth of the younger. Tony felt it too, a form of fond address that went deeper than just the word, but hinted at the relationship between the two. 

“Councilor,” Daniel replied and shook hands. “Sorry for the delay getting home, but we ran into… a complication.”

With a wry lifted eyebrow, Hammond merely said, “Of course you did. What was it this time?”

“Well, the Captain was not happy we took away one of his people, with his super ATA Gene and breeding potential, and thought he could do an end run around the Nineteenth Clause… the Captain, himself, came in a shuttle with Gibbs and a few other interested parties to try and strong arm us into handing over our new shaman.”

There were no flies on Hammond as he studied Daniel and the ‘new shaman’.

“Ah. And I suppose he’s why the Lanteans are taking an unusual interest in our current attack?”

“That’s pretty much a guarantee, sir. Councilor Hammond, I’d like you to meet Tony DiNozzo, shaman. Tony, our First Councilor, George Hammond.”

“Good to meet you, son,” Hammond said, offering to shake hands. “You’re certainly welcome here. And the only way you’ll leave is if you *want* to.”

Tony hesitated… touching hands hadn’t gone so well for him the last time, and he realized he hadn’t seriously touched anyone but another shaman since then. But it was obviously expected of him…

He reached out before Daniel could offer a warning, “Uhh, that might not be… never mind.”

Because the two had already connected. 

Tony was buffeted by a flashing slide show presentation of another life… a full and productive life of honor, service, responsibility, a devotion to his people and family. A few tragic events… the loss of his dear wife of many years, his own aging body taking him out of the field and the militia service in the Guardian team of the last Alpha Sentinel for the SGC… too many battles, and not enough of them unqualified wins…

Gently, humbly, Tony pulled back his hand, stared at it for a moment, then blinked, and met the councilor’s amused pale blue eyes. “Sir. It’s an honor.”

Å 

Sam Carter was giving her sitrep on the harbor docks as everyone kept an eye on the nearby water surface. They could all see the congregating shadows squirming in the water. 

“The traps on the coastal river outlets have been clogged with larvae since yesterday, but our first warning was the flocks of pelicans and rocs gathering overhead, two days ago. So we were already on alert and watching the inlets all along the coast. The usual predators have also gathered for the feast, as expected, and we are watching them carefully, in case they are too young, too inexperienced or too desperate to take the necessary care not to be hosted as they feed. 

“But it seems these schools remember exactly where we are, since those valleys without human habitation have seen no activity. So these larvae must be of Hathor’s spawning. She and her daughters are the only queens who have been using these waters in recent times.”

“Well, that goes without saying,” McKay muttered, winning no more than an eye-roll from the woman. “Well, it’s true! Everyone knows the queens are super territorial and aggressive… there’s a reason this is called Hathor’s Sea!” and he waved at the ocean. 

Carter shrugged… the annoying man was right. The four oldest goa’uld queens, and their respective daughters, still dominated the waters of the world-spanning Ocean. North of the equator and east of the northern continent was Hathor’s Sea. On the west side was Morrigan’s Sea. South of the equator, east of the southern continent was Niirti’s Sea, and on the west was Bast’s Sea. 

“Is Hathor with them, do you think?” Jack asked eagerly. If she was… he had a personal score to settle with that snake.

“Unknown,” Teal’c supplied. “She has twice taken a human host in recent times, and what intelligence she has acquired from that may make her harder to track.”

“Not harder to locate, though,” Blair argued. He patted Jack on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, man. If she’s here, I can find her.”

His mouth a grim line, Jack merely nodded. “How many, do you think?”

Spencer Reid answered, “Three hundred twenty seven inside the harbor. A growing number in the schools collecting outside… growing exponentially. Over a hundred thousand right now. I’m tempted to suggest we use Shaman DiNozzo’s strategy again… it seems very effective in large groups like this.”

Every sentinel gave a shudder at that. “Hell no!” a lot of them protested in a knee-jerk reaction.

Jim Ellison elaborated. “Kid took a decade off my life, just jumping into goa’uld infested water like that! Even if it was just in spirit form. And no, Chief, don’t even *think* about it.”

Blair pouted, while Spencer Reid cocked his head to one side. “There might be a variation we could try, however, based on the assumption that the goa’uld can’t tell the difference between a physical presence and a sufficiently corporeal spirit, so that we can draw them into a trap. Over three hundred spread over the harbor is going to be a difficult target. And I’m rather tired of having to stun them one at a time.”

“Just tell me I get a chance to cut a few of them apart this time,” young Buffy Summers muttered, to general agreement from her older and wiser sentinel cohorts. 

Her equally young partner Willow nodded. “And I like the whole shock-em-silly-with-shamany-goodness thing. Anything that makes it harder for them to reach us.”

Alpha Sentinel Aaron Hotchner, Hotch, studied his partner closely. His dark stern looks were often mistaken for a dour and humorless hard-ass nature. “I’m willing to listen to any reasonable plan that doesn’t result in any of us hosted. What do you have in mind, Reid?”

Spencer had just opened his mouth, when, overhead, three Lantean shuttles appeared, soaring over the Signal Hills to hover over the docks. 

One extended a ramp down and the tall, thin form of Commander Gibbs stalked down to meet them. He sent his sharp, ice-blue eyes at the people collected in front of him, and noted that one was conspicuous in his absence. The only one he really wanted to face. But he set his mouth against the bitter disappointment. He had known it would be highly unlikely these Elpers would allow him access to DiNozzo, if they had any warning of his arrival. 

“You people got a big problem out there in the open water. You know that, right? And a few hundred a lot closer to home.”

Jack once again took the lead, and with a smirk, Ellison let him. Cheyenne was in his territory, after all. “Used your scanners, didja, commander? Well good for you. So you know we’ve got three hundred forty seven…”

Spencer coughed with a correction, “Three hundred twenty seven…”

“Whatever. Yeah, Gibbs, we know. You want to help us out with it, or let us swing slowly in the wind, as usual? Oh, and, just a heads up, we think they’re all Hathor’s spawn. They got that genetic memory thing, her intel on just where to find all the best hosts in the SGC.”

Suddenly, Jack had Gibbs’ full and complete attention. “Hathor’s spawn?”

“Oh yeah. Thought that might interest you. So. You want to give us a hand here, or just hang around, hoping for a glimpse of the DiNozzo kid? ‘Cause, I gotta tell ya, fat chance. Kid had a panic attack just knowing you were coming after him. He was dangerous enough at your big inauguration do. Who knows what he might do if you come anywhere near him now.”

Gibbs’ eyes narrowed at Jack, then he gave a signal to his men, and began barking orders into his Lantean comm unit. “Pacci, get after the larvae outside the harbor. Balboa, scan the coastline for other schools, and any hostings. Burley, you’re with me. Hover over the inner harbor, get a fix on every larva. Start with surgical sniper strikes, take out as many as you can. And if you find a queen out there… she’s mine. Track her but do not approach.”

O’Neill scowled. “Oh, you think so, do you, Commander Gibbs? You’re not the only one who’s lost family to that bitch. You do realize that, right? So what gives you the goddamned right to come stomping in here in your seven-league Lantean boots, and give the orders in *my* province?”

The shamans all shuddered at the threat in the air, and hastily built up shields to keep it out. But since this seemed like the sort of argument that would take time they may not have, and there was a tentative plan on the board, they backed away to confer.

Since the Prime and other Alphas were getting their heads together, McKay figured he was superfluous to requirements, and took advantage of the chance to do some conferring of his own. So he pulled Sam to the side, nearer the *Puddle Jumper*. 

Back when he was CSO, McKay had taken the promising young woman under his tutelage, and she excelled in every type of engineering and physics. She was particularly good at repairing tech, even reverse-engineering some of the more mysterious and esoteric Atlantis toys. The fact she had no ATA Gene was actually an advantage, as it prevented her from accidentally turning something on as she handled unknown bits and pieces.

To his own embarrassment, McKay had developed something of a crush on his student… it might even have gone somewhere if they weren’t like oil and water with each other… arguments blowing up out of nothing could be invigorating in the short term, but the constant abrasive interactions did not make for healthy long-term relationships. McKay was all too aware that he did not do long term relationships. Most people hated his guts on sight. By now, he accepted that as fact even before he met them. He had no time for people was much of the problem... there was too much to learn, too much to do, too many other responsibilities... It made him freer to do what he wanted and thought best, rather than expend valuable time and energy to win them over... He did his best not to care for the opinions of others. Most of them were idiots anyway... He certainly went out of his way to make sure no one else ever realised just how much it secretly bothered him. 

Until he met John Sheppard, he had never had a relationship with anyone that lasted past the first serious disagreement... marked in days, usually... and McKay had a sneaking suspicion that was almost entirely because of the sentinel-guide bond. If he weren’t a shaman... if he weren’t *John’s* shaman... he wondered if that incredibly attractive and awesome man would ever have given him the time of day. 

As for Sam, she could appreciate McKay’s brilliance, and did have a sneaking fondness for the difficult man, without particularly wanting to spend extended periods of time with the guy. 

Once Sam returned to the SGC, she proved to be especially good at mending and adapting any tech salvaged, scrounged by Daniel on his digs. This is what won her a place on Jack’s Guardian team. She and McKay had managed to create and maintain a ‘friendly’ rivalry since then, built on competition, and getting charged from their heated arguments.

In fact, she and McKay had a rather *special* project going that required them both to work together. 

John Sheppard found plenty of reasons to hike back onboard the tethered *Puddle Jumper*, to shift around some of the less… ummm… legal cargo in the hold, looking for something explosive they could use on the goa’uld… and not get arrested for having it. This gave both McKay and Sam an opportunity to join him, for their whispered conversations. No one would question McKay joining his mate on board their ship. 

Meanwhile, Blair gave a tug on Daniel’s link, to give him warning that his sentinel was about to get into it, and might need his presence. For, you know, whatever. Calming influence, support, a boost of power… and then, because they had bigger and more dangerous fish to fry just now, he nodded to his other three Alpha shamans still present and they pulled away to find a higher shelf on the bulwark wall to sit and meditate. 

Teal’c remained with O’Neill, anticipating a satisfactory level of violence to come. There was not much love lost between Elpers and any member of the SFD.

“Do we get to try Tony’s trick after all?” Willow asked excitedly, but on a spirit level she could only hope her sentinel wouldn’t hear. 

Blair chuckled. “A variation of it, maybe. Spencer, you had an idea there?”

“It would need both Willow and Luna to accomplish. Your magic, anyway. Is there a spell for making a phantom person? Something solid enough, with enough tags for a goa’uld’s senses to detect and register as a real human?” 

The ladies traded a look. Luna gave a hum of speculation. “A transfiguration spell would do it. We could create a human from some inanimate item. Make it seem like it fell off the side of a boat or dock and was struggling to swim back to safety. That ought to bring all the larvae in to battle for the right to host.”

“Ooh, good one, Spencer,” Willow agreed. “How come we never came up with an idea like that before?”

Blair nudged into the younger man. “Maybe because he’s a genius? Which of you is best at casting a transfiguration?”

“That would be me,” Luna said, even as Willow chimed in, “That would be Luna. Definitely.”

Blair nodded. “Okay. Luna, what do you need?”

Luna came out of her trance enough to look around the docks for something suitable. It would be easier with something of similar mass, and organic, if not living, for the best effect and least drain on her resources. A piled heap of burlap sacks filled with milled flour would serve her purpose nicely. 

“And *then* do we get to blast them with psychic shock?”

Å 

Putting their mutual animosity on hold for the moment, Jack and Gibbs actually managed to cooperate with Blair’s plan, when he interrupted the pissing contest to explain. Gibbs might protest being relegated to observer status, but Jim Ellison, the Alpha Sentinel Prime of Novelle, endorsed the order.

“Give them a chance, Gibbs. If it doesn’t work, we’ll look at other options. But until then, this seems the safest way to kill a whole bunch of the snakes at once. I’m kinda curious myself, if it’ll work or not. If it does… we’ll see how far we can get, how many we can finish off using the same strategy. So yeah, Commander Gibbs, as Alpha Prime in command, I order you to stand down, for now. You can observe, if you want, but don’t interfere, until I give you the word.”

The others around the place were somewhat disappointed… they had been looking forward to the fireworks, in no doubt of who the winner would be. A spoiled and entitled Lantean leaning on tech to fight his battles for him, against a down-and-dirty brawler like Alpha Sentinel O’Neill? Forgone conclusion. But then… a goa’uld attack was no laughing matter, and being distracted was the worst possible thing they could do. The little fuckers were too good at taking advantage. 

Maybe later. If they were lucky.

None of the scans done, by the Lantean shuttles or the shamans, revealed a goa’uld queen in nearby waters. If Hathor was around, she was hanging back, waiting to see what happened, hoping for her spawn to soften up the prey and make it easy for her to come in later. Which would be a level of strategic and tactical thinking they had never seen in the goa’uld before, even the older queens with countless spawning and hosting cycles behind them, or male drones in their human hosts who had learned to resist the spawning instinct. The goa’uld queens were much longer lived than any of their sons, able to take hosts multiple seasons, their life-spans limited only by the amount of strain they could endure during spawning, how long it took them to recuperate after laying eggs, and how successful they were at evading predators, land-based or ocean-going. It was speculated that Hathor, and the three other oldest queens, had been mature when Atlantis had first Landed upon Novelle. She was certainly cunning enough. 

There were a number of shallow skiffs around the harbor, hauled up on the docks. One was pushed into the water, and the person getting into it moved with odd, jerky motions, as if it weren’t used to knees and elbows, and was having trouble balancing on two legs. It seemed to heave itself around, as if its center of gravity was different, in little hops. It used a pole to push off the pier, and then dropped it into the water. All around the shallow craft, dark shapes swarmed in the eddies and shadows. When the clumsy figure tripped and fell into the water with a yell, then floundered as if it didn’t have a clue how to swim, or even float, and the skiff skittered away over the waves, well out of reach… 

They came from everywhere, hundreds of them, all battling each other to get there first. Blue blood stained the water, squeals of larvae pierced the air and echoed oddly through the salt water, and bits of flesh and dark fins began to float to the surface. 

And still they came, and still the figure in the water floundered and thrashed, fighting to keep its head above the surface. 

“Now?” pleaded Willow. 

Reid grinned and Blair chuckled. 

“Now,” the Alpha Prime agreed. 

Four of them concentrated, focussed, gathered up all their hatred and disgust for the goa’uld, since that seemed to be what leant Tony his power, and then they aimed it straight at the swarm. 

It was devastatingly effective. The skiff practically shattered. The human-like figure sank like dead weight, spilling flour into the bloodied water to make a ghastly lumpy light-blue mass. 

Dories held in reserve paddled out, and the sentinels aboard made swift ends of the few stunned but still-living larvae floating to the surface. Linked to their shaman partners, they were able to zero in on their targets, and finish them off. 

“Three hundred twelve…” Spencer reported. “Where are the… oh, no, they’re caught up in the flour sack, and they’re dead too. Three hundred twenty seven.”

“Any chance we can do that with the ones outside the harbor?” Jack called out from one of the dories. 

“Well…” Spencer considered. “Any we can’t reach at the same time will be too wary to be caught in a second volley. Unless we let some of them into the contained area of the harbor, where there’s no communication with the ones outside?”

Å 

The Lanteans on the shuttle looked on in mute astonishment. 

“Commander…” ventured Burley, Gibbs’ second. “Did you know they could do that?” 

Gibbs shot the man a disgusted look. “Never mind what they’re doing. Scan for survivors.”

“None sir. But… Just coming up on the outer range… a queen, sir.”

“Hathor?”

“No way to tell without a DNA test, sir, and we’d need a body for that…”

“Then let’s go get one.”

“Sir… if we make a move on the outside swarm, it’ll warn them that we know they’re there, and they’ll scatter. And Alpha Prime Ellison ordered you to stand down until…”

“Yeah? So? You have your orders, Burley. *My* orders, not some half-assed recommendation from some damn Elper.”

“Yes, sir.”

Å 

They opened both sets of the lock gates at the harbor mouth for just ten minutes, then slammed them closed on a few dozen larvae that were too slow to squirm past in time. It must have looked to those outside as if maybe a host had succeeded in climbing to the top of the south-side Signal Hill, taken over the lock controls to let them in, then maybe been overcome by the human defenders. That’s what it must have *looked* like. And what happened once might happen again, so it was worth their while to wait around and see if they would get another chance.

Thousands had entered the inner harbor this time. More than had ever got this far through the Cheyenne defenses. And most of those that had got this far hadn’t survived long. But previous failures didn’t matter much to a goa’uld… they all, every single one, thought they were better than any of the others, and *could* not fail at anything they attempted.

And when the figure in the skiff went pin-wheeling into the water…

Thousands died in the shock wave. But there was a cost to such an expenditure of mental energy. The sentinels were more than equal to the clean-up, but once finished, they registered the exhaustion in their partners, and returned to the docks to take their shamans in hand. A rest of an hour or so, at the least, a hot meal maybe, would have to be administered as soon as possible. There was no hurry, after all. Hosting season usually lasted a ten-day, there were waves after waves of larvae schools swarming to the shores, river mouths and harbor gates, and there were more and more arriving all the time just outside the Signal Hills. They would be there for days, and that would allow them to try this new effective tactic a few times a day, without wearing out their shamans unduly.

Well, that was the idea, anyway. 

Spencer felt her first, on the very edge of his consciousness. He took a deep breath, gathered his last resources, and Blair was suddenly there with him. 

“Spence? What do you see, man?”

“A queen. I think it may be Hathor... old… memories of Atlantis, clear as if first-hand… It could be her. She’s just coming into range. She saw the gates open… or maybe her spawn reported to her that it happened. They think one of them caught a human host and opened the gates for them… They’re waiting for it to happen again. And this time, the queen will come herself.”

“Oh man… Jack! Jack, we need to pull our little trap one more time!”

“Chief!” Jim warned, objection in his tone.

“Just one more time! There’s a queen out there, could be Hathor, or if not, it’s one of her older daughters… this time she wants in! Jack? This is your town, man, I know that, but… It could be Hathor, man. We *all* want a piece of that queen.”

Jack glanced at Jim Ellison, the Alpha Sentinel Prime, and the last word on this stuff, even Jack admitted that. And it was his guide on the front line, Daniel was still back at the Enviro with Tony. 

“Jim…” It was a heart-breaking plea. No sentinel could deny the need in it.

Hathor had been the first queen to take a human host. The first to recognize their value. She and her spawn had done untold damage in the past century. With the race memory of the queen who spawned them, all of her offspring craved, needed, restricted themselves to human-shaped hosts alone. Their attacks were vicious, ruthless, unrelenting. In human-shaped hosts with human-like intelligence, they plotted and planned and attacked in coordinated battles, forcing defenders to make war on people with the faces of friends, families, lovers. It was a devastating assault on the Novelle colonists. 

For many of them, it was personal. One of Hathor’s spawn had taken Teal’c as host. Another had taken Jack’s son Charlie. Teal’c had been rescued, freed, and he was one of the lucky ones. 

Jack had been forced to shoot his own son… to save his wife and daughter. Only to lose them after all, when Sara and little Grace left him for another… a farmer, someone ‘who didn’t have the blood of our son on their hands’. 

And Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Commander in the SFD? It was a host with one of Hathor’s spawn who broke into his family quarters on Atlantis, and murdered his wife and daughter while he was leading a hosting-season defense of LA.

Lots of people had a personal reason to hate that particular goa’uld.

“Okay, Jack. One more time. I don’t think our shamans are going to have much trouble scraping up the anger they’re going to need this time.”

“Wait…” Blair hesitated, his expression going from confused to appalled. “Oh man…”

“What, Chief? What?”

“She’s gone. Hathor’s… gone.” 

Å


	7. Chapter 7: "You're more like your coyote than you know."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A word on my Spirit Guides: In *‘The Sentinel’* canon, Jim Ellison’s is a black jaguar, Blair Sandburg’s is a grey wolf. Harry Potter’s Patronus is a stag, and so is his spirit guide. Same with Luna Lovegood’s hare. As for Don’s moose… actor Rob Morrow who plays Don Eppes in *‘Numb3rs’* also starred in the TV series *‘Northern Exposure’*, which features a moose in the credits. My head canon for Daniel Jackson is a crow spirit guide – ‘Oooh sparkly’ attitude, and associated with death and resurrection, for a character who dies at least once per season of *‘Stargate SG-1’* and in 2 of 3 movies. My head canon for Tony DiNozzo, the self-proclaimed ‘Wild Card’ of *‘NCIS’*, has *got* to be the trickster, Coyote. The others are author’s choice.

Å 

Immature goa’uld larvae with the memories of the oldest and most dominant queens didn’t *behave* like normal larvae. Hathor, Niirti, Morrigan, Bast… they had all gotten a taste of a human or Magical host… and their spawn ever after remembered those advantages, and were capable of a level of intelligence other larvae weren’t. One of the advantages of that greater intelligence was the ability to over-ride base instincts, and think with greater strategic benefit.

So when the schools in open waters realized their greatest enemies (and most valued hosts) had detected their presence, and killed the oldest queen among them… The weapons of the human sky-boats pierced the waves, chasing and killing them in their hundreds. It was a feast for those desperate enough with starvation not to care about the risk. And so the hundreds more who lingered to feed also felt the piercing fire-lances cut them to shreds.

But *hundreds of thousands* scattered and fled to deeper waters. Those intelligent enough to quell their hunger. Those wary enough to fear the enemies collected in the skies above the waves. In other words, evolution and survival had once again selected for superior specimens. 

Another chance would come to raid that richest of host-grounds. It always did.

Å 

“You total and complete bastard!” Jack shouted, as he advanced on the Commander. 

Gibbs looked altogether too smug and self-satisfied, and it drove Jack absolutely feral with fury. How the Lantean didn’t realize the threat Jack posed… not until a fist connected explosively with his chin, anyway, landing him flat on his ass. Gibbs was up in a moment, red-faced with humiliation and rage, ready to engage the enemy.

Alpha sentinels reached out to claw Jack back, while Gibbs’ Lantean SFD forces held their commander. 

“What the hell were you thinking, you utter and complete bastard!” Jack demanded, still panting with anger.

“I’d like to know that myself,” Alpha Sentinel Prime Ellison agreed, only a little more moderately than his brother sentinel. “You realize the schools have disappeared now? They won’t be back until they believe it safe to make another attempt. We had an opportunity to get *all* of them in this one day, draw them into our trap with *no* threat to anyone, and you sank that chance all to hell. So I want to know why. What were you thinking?”

Gibbs rubbed at his bruised jaw, tongue finding the source of blood on the inside of his cheek. He glared, saying, “I don’t answer to you, Elper.”

“I think you do,” Ellison growled, much like his black jaguar, pacing back and forth behind him with tail thrashing. “As Alpha Sentinel Prime of Novelle, I out-rank you in all military matters, Commander Gibbs. According to the Twenty-First Clause of the Novelle Charter, I even outrank you boss, the Captain, Commander in Chief of the Atlantis Security Force Division in any colony-based conflict. I gave you a direct order to stand down and await our efforts to draw in more larvae to our trap, and you violated that order. You disobeyed, you insubordinate bastard, and who knows the cost of our failure to contain the goa’uld threat here today. The Higher Powers help you if even one life is lost, or made host, because of your fuck-up.”

Gibbs glowered. He had no fear that his insubordination would cost him… maybe a slap on the wrists… certainly not more than that. The complaints of an Elper would never hold water with any Lantean.

“We got Hathor,” he told them, sullenly. 

Burley winced beside him. “We think we did… we’ll have to check DNA results before…”

“We got Hathor! The queen of queens. That’s gotta be worth somethin’.”

Ellison folded his arms across his chest. “Not enough. We would have had her anyway, if you hadn’t blown our plan out of the water… literally! No. You know what? I’ll be talking to your superiors, not you. I know we won’t get much satisfaction there, but what the hell, enough people find out about your loose-cannon fuck-up here today, maybe they’ll have sense enough to trim your wings for you. You get to go home to your precious City, with your lousy one parasite, and test the hell out of it. I don’t care. Get lost, Gibbs, and take your people with you. Oh, and… we’ll all remember this day. Don’t think we won’t. And when the day comes, very soon now, when you need *our* assistance in something… well. I don’t think the request had better come from you, Gibbs.”

That was close as any of them were willing to come to acknowledging what they all knew…. That the last remaining Atlantis power cell was nearing terminal entropy. McKay had brought them that intelligence, as had Reid, but the strongest of the hidden ATA carriers among them had all known too. Maybe Gibbs wasn’t high enough on the food chain to know that little fact, still being kept from the Lantean general population.

“I want to see DiNozzo before I go.”

“No. Leave. Now.”

“Sir…” Burley ventured, already seeing a disaster in the making. He wasn’t nearly as confident as his superior that they were bullet-proof on charges of insubordination and disobeying direct orders… “Maybe we should return to the City, report our findings, submit our evidence.” And, although he didn’t say it, get ahead of this shit-storm before it could get any worse.

Gibbs scowled at his second, and only then seemed to realize that he and his all-too-small band of SFD troops had no friends among this crowd. Chin held high (bruised dark purple as it was), shoulders back, spine stiffened straight, he turned on his heel, and with a gesture, got his troops loaded on the shuttle. It took off, the other two hovering near sweeping in guard positions, they flew off.

Å 

The more distracted Daniel got, the more anxious Tony became. Part of it was a security-blanket kind of thing… Daniel’s attention meant others steered clear of them both. But as Daniel bent over the planning table with Councilor Hammond and the other elders, reviewing reports and maps where goa’uld movements had been detected, people, a *lot* of people, began to encroach upon their space. 

Most of them were men. All sported red arm-bands, the identification of militia volunteers, in the SGC, and among the other provinces as well, as he discovered when he asked. The ones edging closer all had purple borders to the red, as most of the militia did not. And every one of them stared at him, intent, with nostrils flaring, rubbing arms, tilting heads to the side as if listening to something faint, on the edges of their senses… 

Ah. Sentinels. These were all sentinels. Probably un-bonded sentinels. But there were so many of them! How were there so many? He counted a dozen just here clustered at the planning table, three of them women. He thought sentinels were supposed to be rare. As in, not nearly so many of them all in one place. 

Nervously, he tried to brush even closer to Daniel, only to accidentally bump the older man into the table. Blinking, the Alpha Shaman looked around, saw what was happening with blinking eyes behind his wire-rim glasses, and huffed. 

“Okay, you lot, back off. Shaman Tony is a guest here, and he hasn’t been trained yet, so… back off and wait your turn.”

Although most looked chagrinned, like kids caught reaching for a cookie jar, and obeyed their Alpha Shaman’s ‘request’, one of them lingered, thrusting out a chin. “And the LA sentinels will get first crack after he’s trained, not us! They always do. How is that fair?”

Daniel’s blue eyes hardened and chilled to ice. “Because LA doesn’t have an Alpha pair, and all the other provinces do. Theirs is the greatest need. Or have you forgotten that fact?”

The young man was good-looking enough, Tony supposed, but the belligerent attitude made him jumpy. And Daniel was especially annoyed with this guy. It was in his bristling imaginary whiskers. Or ruffled imaginary feathers, Tony corrected himself, considering the shadowy crow sitting on Daniel’s shoulder was hissing at the militiaman. 

“Pete. Come on. Changed your mind, have you? Or is it just that Sam’s not here?”

Pete reddened, turned and stalked away, drawing huffs of amusement from the elders gathered at the table. 

Hammond gave a cautionary, “Daniel…”

Daniel held up a hand. “Oh, I know. It’s none of my business. Sam can make her own decisions. I quite agree. It’s just…”

Hammond merely patted his shoulder, and they returned to the reports. Daniel seemed periodically to stand, gaze into a vague distance… Tony was pretty sure he was connecting with his sentinel partner. They were getting news from the port about the ongoing hosting crisis. When the name Hathor came up… well, Daniel was just about ready to drop everything and race down to the harbor, but Hammond convinced him to stay. Luckily for Tony, because, between being left alone with a bunch of strangers and an unknown number of predatory sentinels, and going down to the docks to risk confronting Gibbs… well, that was a decision Tony wasn’t ready to make.

Then a tall dark-haired man sidled up behind Daniel, and the Alpha Shaman grew, by degrees, colder and colder, the closer this new person approached. Tony wasn’t sure if this guy was a sentinel or not… he bore no red armband, purple border or not, and Tony also wasn’t so sure if his interest was in Tony, or Daniel himself.

Tony was pretty sure this guy would cross some invisible line, and… yup. Daniel jerked, whirled and glared at this man. “Simmons. I thought Jack told you not to come near me again? I’m pretty sure I made my own preferences known… if I never see you again it’ll be too soon.”

The man, Simmons, gave a smarmy smile. “Now don’t be that way, Doctor Jackson. I’m as interested in protecting our people as anyone…”

“No, I don’t believe you are. Get out of my sight. Now.”

“And your new shaman? You don’t think it’s my job to vet a stranger from Atlantis you let wander into the very center of our planning council? What if he’s a spy for them?”

“And that’s why I don’t believe you have *anyone’s* good at heart. Get out.”

Hammond frowned. “Mr. Simmons. I believe you have other duties right now. Please go attend to them, elsewhere.”

Simmons bowed to the elder. “Yes, of course, sir.” And he melted back into the crowd. 

Tony found it difficult to settle his hackles down… his, or his coyote’s. The guy was a spook. He had Intel written all over him. Well, maybe not literally, because only someone Lantean born was allowed into the actual Intel ranks… although Tony knew the intelligence gathering unit did have ‘paid’ Elper spies scattered around…

Hammond sighed, then said, “He is good at what he does, Daniel. Jack knows this too, or he’d have been fired long ago and sent to the farms. And if he is a double agent, as you both suspect, better we keep him close and under watch.”

Daniel scowled. “Yes, and that’s going to back-fire on us, sooner or later. Look, I… I need a break. I think Tony could use a drink and a snack, too. Tony? This way.”

Tony studied the other shaman, head to one side. “You *really* don’t trust that guy, do you?” 

Daniel winced. “That obvious, hunh?”

“No, but… it’s different. That other guy, Pete…”

“Pete Shanahan. Pete’s okay, really… but he’s been courting our tech team-mate, Sam Carter, for almost a year now.”

“And you don’t approve.”

“Well, Pete is a sentinel, and Sam… amazing as she is in almost every way… well, our Sam isn’t a shaman. Maybe the potential is there, shamans are made, not born, after all, but she’s never shown any inclination to follow that path. Oh, I get that anyone would be attracted to her, she’s gorgeous, brilliant, courageous, inventive… what’s not to like? And she could certainly make a kick-ass guide if she were so inclined… But… sooner or later, it’s all gonna end in tears, I just know it.”

“So you don’t trust him not to break her heart, but otherwise… you do sorta trust him.”

Daniel gave this due consideration. “Yeah… yeah, I guess I do. I guess it’s because he’s a sentinel. As a shaman I’m kinda hard-wired to trust him. And I have no doubt of his motives and dedication where the Tribe is concerned. He’ll do his duty, I know that. And... it’s maybe more likely Sam will break *his* heart.”

“Ah.”

“Ah?”

“Well… it’s not so much that you do or don’t trust *him*… but you do trust Sam to make her own decisions.”

“Yes… yes, I guess I do at that.” Daniel studied the new shaman. Poor socialization, maybe… but the kid was catching on, *fast*. “But Simmons? You said it’s different with him?”

Tony looked wary. “Is… is this a test?”

Daniel smiled. “Think of it more as a training exercise. What do you get from my reaction to Simmons?”

“Well, considering that you seem more than willing to give everyone else the benefit of the doubt… except for him… has he done something to make you doubt him?”

Daniel frowned. “Not… not that I can prove. It’s just a feeling I have…”

“A crawling feeling up your spine?”

“Oh yeah.”

“You don’t trust him. On the most fundamental level, you don’t trust him. Not just around you and people you care about, but you don’t trust him with the welfare of the Tribe. You said as much. You don’t believe he is as interested in protecting your people as anyone.”

Daniel nodded slowly, considering the younger shaman. “That’s it, exactly.”

“Is he a sentinel? I... couldn’t tell. And I could with the others.” 

“You know, I’m not sure about that. He hasn’t manifested, if he is...”

“But you’ve got so many here. At last a dozen, just here right now, and that’s just the un-bonded ones. That’s a lot, isn’t it? I don’t think there’s been a single sentinel manifest on Atlantis in more than three generations. Do all the provinces have so many?” 

“According to the histories, yes. The percentage of active sentinels in the colonist populations seems to be growing, generation over generation. The increase in number and violence of goa’uld attacks, a definite threat to the Tribe, is a stressor that is known to bring a sentinel out of latency. We may have a large proportion of people with the necessary genetics, but who haven’t been... switched on yet, for whatever reason. It can’t just be the availability of shamans, rare as we are... Most sentinels are unbonded, or quite well matched with trained guide partners they can trust. Those at a higher level are most attracted to shamans, of course, but they can partner with anyone, really, displaying psychic or empathic sensitivities. They can use their senses to a far greater level when they have some kind of guide as a partner. But even a formal bond is not really necessary... often not even wanted. Blair thinks the bond is what makes an Alpha pair... that close and intimate relationship, enhancing the abilities of both bond-mates. 

“So, yes, we have a lot of sentinels, and yes, most of them are unbonded, and yes, they probably find you very attractive, for either a partner, or a mate. But their primary instinct is to protect the shaman, protect the guide, protect the Tribe. You don’t need to worry about them attacking you, Tony. Really. They can smell how uncomfortable you are, and now that I’ve called them on crowding you, they’ll stay back. Even Pete. Especially Pete.”

“And Simmons?”

Daniel shook his head, scowling and looking around suspiciously. “Him... I don’t know about. Now that you come to point it out to me... A lot of my unease around him could be because he’s a latent sentinel who *can’t* manifest, because he’s... I don’t know... too damaged? Too corrupt? Unable to express sentinel drives?”

“You think he’s a threat to the Tribe.”

Slowly, Daniel nodded. “I hadn’t actually formulated my reaction that way, but... Yeah. Yeah. I do. The guy is a stone psychopath, and that kind of personality disorder is anathema to both shamans and sentinels. Hm… I’ll have to consider the implications of that… But later. You know, I think you’ll prove to be a very useful addition to our ranks, Shaman DiNozzo.”

Tony winced. “Being *useful* hasn’t always been good for me.”

Daniel chuckled. “Don’t worry, Tony. All I meant was, new blood means new perspectives, new energy, new ways of looking at things. You bring all that to the table, and more. Like your *unique* way of handling the goa’uld. *That* was inspired, by the way. You know, the others consider me, and Rodney and Spencer, to be a bit on the clue-resistant side where it comes to our relationships with people. We all three are apt to get distracted by shiny things… new ideas, interesting projects… we’re attracted to knowledge, tend to deal better with things and ideas than people. It’s Blair, Luna and Willow who have the people skills. I figured, because of your background, you’d be more on my side than Blair’s, but now I wonder.”

“I… I’m not comfortable, being around so many people.”

“Well, you’re not used to it, for sure. That may change. We’ll have to see… And I think you could probably use some training in self-defense… quite apart from shaman skills, you would probably benefit from learning some hand-to-hand moves… ask Teyla. She does this stick-fighting thing with two wooden batons. More like dancing than fighting, really, but it could give you added confidence, that you can defend yourself, stand up to bullies, whether they be un-bonded sentinels, or big, male, military-trained suitors.”

Tony frowned at the scholar-shaman. “It sounds like you won’t be coming with us?”

Daniel shrugged. “This is home. I’m their Alpha Shaman Guardian. I’m sworn to defend this place and these people. This hosting season is going to last a couple of ten-days, and I need to be on hand in case someone is taken. Sheppard and Blair aren’t going to want to hang around if they don’t need to. Sheppard has deliveries to make and passengers to get home, and Blair’s going to want you at the Sanctuary as soon as possible. Don’t worry, though. I’m sure we’ll be keeping in touch. In fact…” 

Suddenly, Daniel went rigid, bolting upright. “Oh hell, no! Jack’s got into a fight… *again*! If he goes feral... Gotta go. You stick close to Hammond, for now. He’ll take good care of you, until we get rid of the Lanteans.”

Å 

“Next stop, Cascade,” Blair declared cheerfully, as the *Puddle Jumper* surged out into the open ocean once more. It would take another ten-day to sail around the barren southern edges of the northern continent, round Cape Stormy, through the treacherous Stormy Straits, to reach its west coast, where Cascade Province could be found. 

Turned out, Daniel had been right about the Alpha Shaman Prime and the Captain of the *Puddle Jumper* wanting to get underway as soon as possible. They’d been delayed overnight, McKay and Reid having disappeared with Sam Carter on some mysterious errands of their own. When they did return, it was speaking a kind of shorthand jargon impenetrable by the rest of them, even if it was at a pace slow enough to catch more than one word in ten. Spencer Reid had trailed in their wake, occasionally offering suggestions of his own that tended to surprise the other two scientists, mostly forgetting he was there in their orbit. 

But, by mid-day the second day, the *Puddle Jumper* was re-loaded, all passengers and crew accounted for, the seas declared clear, and the weather fine, the tide was in, and Sheppard ordered the lines untied. They raised sail outside the Signal Hills and were on their way once more.

The passengers kept glancing into the water, just to see if they had accumulated a trail of goa’uld larvae… but it seemed the hosting season was over, and the local schools knew better than to come in too close. Soon, a pod of dolphins approached, coasting on the bow waves. Since goa’uld larvae were their favorite treats, hunted with enthusiasm and much success, where you found one, you rarely found the other. The various species of fish or aquatic mammals were never taken host, even if large enough, as they couldn’t reach fresh-water spawning grounds. 

Daniel had indeed spoken to Teyla on Tony’s behalf, and she had readily agreed to teach the new shaman her martial arts discipline. A space was cleared on the main deck, and anyone who could collected to watch. 

Teyla said, “It is my belief that practice of some form of martial art is beneficial to most people, whatever their status. Sentinels can certainly gain added dexterity, coordination, and enhanced fitness. But more, it is the mental discipline it engenders that is of the most value to shamans. It helps with reducing stress, focus, concentration, and quickness of thought.”

Rodney McKay smirked. “She’s been trying to get me to join her for years. Since I bonded to John, in fact. But seeing the bruises he collects at every practice, I think I’ll continue to give it a pass.”

“You’re a spoil sport, Rodney,” Buffy Summers taunted. “Come on, Teyla. Show us what you got.”

Tony had been reluctant, so Buffy had volunteered to spar with Teyla first, to show their new shaman what the bantos rods were all about. Buffy had all the advantages of youth – speed, endurance – combined with sentinel strength and lightning reflexes. She had trained extensively with anyone who would teach her… with Teal’c to learn the Jaffa rituals of combat, with Jim Ellison in a variety of militia fighting techniques, and, strangely, her tech expert, Rupert Giles, knew quite a lot about martial arts. Whenever they quizzed him, he always claimed it was stuff he learned in his ‘misspent youth’. Which wasn’t really an answer at all. 

So the teen sentinel was actually a match for the experienced older woman. And Daniel had been right… it was like dancing. Two beautiful, fit, highly-trained women moving as if choreographed, almost a heart-like beat to their rhythms as they moved, graceful and powerful. Their styles were very different, of course, Teyla with the control, Buffy with sheer energy, but they were both serious and accomplished warriors.

It was just a bit daunting. Tony was absolutely positive that either of these diminutive women could wipe the floor with him. Jim Ellison looked on critically. John Sheppard was clearly proud of Teyla’s prowess. Hotch kept giving Reid frowns, as if continuing an argument neither carried out aloud. Hotch looked like he could hold his own in a fight… not so much the gangly, slightly awkward Reid. While Harry Potter and Luna watched, mesmerized and appreciative, neither showed any inclination to participate. With a smirk, Harry had commented, “Some day I’ll have to give you a demonstration of Wizard dueling. That’s much more my style of fighting.”

When the match finally came to an end… no winner or loser, but by some invisible agreement, they merely stopped and bowed to each other, not even breathing hard… Teyla turned to Tony and raised an eyebrow. 

Blair chuckled at Tony’s wary face, and hopped down from the keg he had been sitting on. “Hey, Teyla, how about you let me spar with Tony? I’m not sure he’s ready for a full on battle just yet, and he should probably learn the katas first anyway. Tony? Join me. I promise not to damage you too much.”

With a sigh, resigned to the notion he wasn’t getting out of this, Tony slipped off his shoes and padded out barefoot on to the deck, to face Blair. They bowed to each other, as Teyla and Buffy had, then began to circle. Each made a few tentative jabs, Blair obviously a student of Teyla’s, because he knew the moves. But when Tony got the idea that Blair was going easy on him… he got a bit angry.

He had watched a lot of surveillance in his time on the City, the militia training sessions, and videos of various martial arts demonstrations, including bantos. He had even practiced the katas in some of the learning tapes the City had shown him. So he didn’t think he was an absolute novice… and as he grappled with Blair, and began to get serious about what he was doing, he found he had also internalized some less-than-legal moves from older historical tapes he had watched. He might not be trained, but… he was scrappy. 

Blair laughed when Tony hooked a leg around his ankle and tripped the Alpha Shaman Prime, flat on his back on the deck. “Good one, man! Teach me not to take any fight seriously! You totally caught me out. And that’s lesson one, right? Never, and I mean *never*, underestimate your opponent.”

After that, Teyla organized a number of sparring partners, one pair at a time due to the lack of space, getting almost everyone involved, except for the Hogwarts Alphas. She took on Ronon herself, and she was probably the only one on the ship, apart from maybe the accomplished Buffy, who might be able to take the man. But even Spencer and Hotch took a turn, as did the LA sentinel, Don Eppes. He had pretty good militia-standard form himself, and in Tony’s next match, with the complaining McKay, offered advice and helpful suggestions.

When Tony retired to pant, cool down and drink water and try to get his racing heart under control, he picked a spot on the sacks of grain under a cargo net. The LA sentinel was close by… he always seemed to be close whenever Tony was above deck. Although, maybe that was just Tony’s imagination, because it wasn’t like there was a lot of room on the ship to begin with. 

Still… it made Tony… uneasy.

Don Eppes sighed. “You don’t have to worry about me, shaman. I’m not about to attack you… or even get too close without your express permission. Okay?”

Tony colored in embarrassment. “Sorry…”

“Hey, not your fault, and I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. I understand. We all understand. Your life hasn’t been your own. You’ve had no control over… well, you’ve had no control. But here’s the thing. Whether you like it or not, whether you understand it or not, we sentinels do have some rather… primitive instincts about things. We may not *need* a shaman as a guide, but we *want* one. In my case, that need is underscored by the fact that LA is the one province that doesn’t have an Alpha Pair. We’ve got a bunch of sentinels, all of us pretty strong, all of us potential Alphas with the right bond-mate… and we all know we’re stronger with an Alpha Pair than without one. Alphas are that level of magnitude greater. So for the good of our local Tribe, we *need* an Alpha Shaman to chose one of us. 

“But here’s the thing. I don’t know if you noticed the other sentinel who came with us to the Inauguration? Ian Edgerton. He’s one of our militia team leaders. When I sent him home with our councilors, one of them my dad, I promised him I wouldn’t take unfair advantage of this situation, of my being on this ship with you, to get closer to you. If you chose a sentinel, when you chose, it *has* to be completely and totally fair. Level playing field. Free Will. Your choice, all the way. And if you decide not to choose one of us, or anyone at all… well, we’ll abide by that. Just as we did for Rodney and Spencer, and all the other shamans who have surfaced in the last decade.”

Tony nodded, relaxing just a shade in the sentinel’s presence. He could… *feel* that Don Eppes was speaking the truth, the truth of his heart. That he was determined to remain hands-off… but could not, for the life of him, prevent himself from ensuring that Tony was… safe. 

He frowned at his toes, wriggling on the sun-warmed wooden deck. “Blair says there’s a reason for this. For my surfacing where and when I did. There’s a reason for all of it. He believes the Spirit Realm has an intelligence to it, that it has a certain sense of the future… that things have to happen in their own way, in their own time. For the good of the Tribe.”

Don gave a crooked smile. “Yeah, that sounds like Blair. He’s usually right about these things, too.”

“Yeah, but see… the Good of the Tribe. Not necessarily the Good of the Shaman. Not sure if I can trust in that. The City was pretty invested in the Good of the Tribe too… and that didn’t work out so good for me.”

Don nodded slowly. “Maybe not. I know the other shamans must have told you… Atlantis… as intelligent as she is, she’s not human. Machines just can’t compute things like happiness or emotional well-being. I bet you confused the hell out of her, when she tried her best to see to your physical well-being and you still weren’t happy.”

“You have the Gene.”

“Yeah, I do. Don’t tell anyone. I may be a sentinel, so, technically, the Lanteans can’t lay a hand on me, but I’m unbonded, so they can insist I come to the City to see if I have a match there. Which I don’t, so… they could make it very difficult for me to leave. There’s also been some talk about adding to the Nineteenth Clause, that any sentinel or shaman with the Gene has to supply sperm or eggs to the Lanteans for breeding purposes. Which makes me feel sick to my stomach, that they could make children of mine, and I’d never get to… well. So… best not let it get around about my Gene. And, yeah, like the City, the Spirit Realm probably has bigger goa’uld to fry than the happiness of the individual… But that’s what your Spirit Guide is for, you know?”

Behind him, a smoky, indistinct moose began to form, resting its big nose on Don’s shoulder.

“I’m not sure I understand…”

Tony’s coyote also appeared. Don grinned at the big shaggy canine. “Well, the Spirit Realm as a whole might not care about an individual’s well-being and happiness, any more than the City, but these guys certainly do. They’re devoted to our own best interests. Not the general greater good, but our own path, our own personal destiny. They lead us to answers to our problems, our conflicts, they appear when a decision needs to be made, to help us decide… when we can’t always see the best path for ourselves. And yeah, sometimes the choice is the lesser of evils, or to a duty, a burden, we may not want to take on… but they’re for us.”

Tony let his fingers card through his coyote’s patchy fur. The creature’s tongue lolled out in a doggy grin as it gazed up at him. There was a kind of promise in that look, a vow to protect and look out for Tony.

Luna came to join them, not even pretending she hadn’t heard the whole conversation. She smiled at the coyote, and said, in her vague way, “Did anyone tell you about Coyote, Tony? All the most ancient myths call him the Trickster. He plays games to lead people to the truth, to their own best interests. You’re more like your coyote than you know.”

Å


	8. Chapter 8: "That will be a great day."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have turned *‘NCIS’* canon characters Abigail Sciuto, Caitlin Todd, Timothy McGee, Jimmy Palmer, Elinor Bishop and Tali David-DiNozzo into Tony’s kids. Their mothers are *‘NCIS’* characters who have had canon affairs with Tony: Wendy Miller, Paula Cassidy, Jeanne Benoit, E.J. Barrett, Zoe Keates, Ziva David, even though only Tali is the canon daughter of Tony, with Ziva. Also, my description of Cascade is modeled half on Scotland, and half on British Columbia (a province of Canada on the west Pacific Coast, straddling the Rocky Mountains, where all of *‘The Sentinel’*, the three Stargate TV series, and most of *‘The Highlander’* TV series were filmed).

Å 

It would take a ten-day, at the least, to navigate the somewhat perilous southern coast of the northern continent. And that was if the weather cooperated.

Bracketed by two mighty mountain ranges in a ‘V’ formation, running north and south along either side, they provided the double backbone for the massive, and still largely unexplored, northern continent interior. The southern spur of the continent was a jumble of rocky points, peninsulas and outcrop islands, as well as sometimes-submerged bottom-reaming rocks hidden at high tides, a definite threat to navigation. It was called Cape Stormy, for reason. In the summer months, these waters were plagued with storms of varying intensity, and the already treacherous currents around and between jagged rocky islets could rip an unwary ship apart. Giving the whole coast a wide berth was the best plan, even if it took longer to sail the Stormy Straits from the east coast SGC to west coast Cascade Province, and the turbulent waters of Morrigan’s Sea. 

The first safe port was Rainier, capitol of Cascade, one of the rare places on the west coast with a sheltered cove deep enough for ships to dock. South of Rainier was low-lying hills, valleys formed around river deltas, orchards and farm-land, where most of the Cascade agriculture took place. Sandbars made it impossible for landing ships, and dangerous in hosting season. Further north, the mountain ramparts closed in, closer to the coast, forming finger-shaped fjords, coves and bays, surrounded by often impenetrable cliffs, or steep inclines rising from heavily forested foothills to the Highlands between peaks, where heather-covered and grassy glens provided grazing for flocks of sheep, llamas, alpacas and goats. 

Blair waxed lyrical, describing the beauties of their province, every vista filled with awe-inspiring mountains, topped with ancient glaciers, and cradling high-suspended lochs of incredible blue. Much of it was inaccessible, more than half the rest was rain-forest wilderness, made for hunting and fishing. 

In other words, made for sentinels.

Å 

Tony still spent the majority of his time with the other shamans. Blair was testing his knowledge base, trying to determine where the holes might be. There didn’t seem to be many of these ‘blind spots’ in his education, but when encountered, they were… disconcerting. The Atlantis AI had not been very good at judging what skills would benefit Tony, which would be required of him, and how they ought to be prioritized. And she had not known enough about the Spirit Plane to offer much instruction there. 

Trying to plead ‘other concerns’ didn’t get him out of his physical training with Teyla. Worse, he couldn’t get anyone to support his case for giving bantos fighting a pass. 

After one particularly grueling session (and, oddly, they were getting more strenuous, the better he got at it) he flopped down next to Rodney McKay, who was once more sitting on a bale of cargo, Lantean tablet on his knees, frowning into the display screen as he typed madly away. 

“It’s not fair,” Tony protested, disgruntled. “How come you get out of training?”

McKay gave him a side-long suspicious gaze. “You telling me I’m fat? Lazy? Weak? Unfit?”

Tony blinked, alarmed that the other shaman could make that leap. “No! Why… No. I didn’t mean to imply anything of the kind. Actually, if you have some way to get out of it, I was hoping you’d let me in on it, so I could take advantage too.”

Whatever hackles McKay had raised seemed to settle down and smooth away. “Oh. Well… no, I don’t. I think my stubborn refusal to get involved in potentially bruise-making activity just finally wore everyone out.”

Tony couldn’t help it. He laughed. “Okay, yeah, that’s gonna take too long for me, and by that time I’ll be trained in spite of myself.”

McKay frowned at him. Tony could feel a little reach in his direction… McKay seemed to be testing, to see if the joke he didn’t get was at his expense. 

“Easy, McSuspicious. I’m not laughing at you, but at me. I’m obviously stuck with the training.” 

Still a little leery, McKay ignored the mangled name and tried to focus on his tablet once more. 

Tony considered the man. He was irascible, yes, had all these sharp edges and bristly spines to him… all defenses, like a porcupine, which probably should have been his spirit animal, rather than the big white bear. A couple of times, Tony had caught McKay when he thought he was alone, calling up his bear and cuddling with him, getting wrapped up in a big ol’ huffing bear-hug. The scientist-shaman might put on a show of not caring if the world hated him, of being above such petty concerns, but Tony was beginning to see through the masks to the insecurity at the core of Rodney McKay. Tony wondered what approach he could use to put the man at ease. 

In this case, he thought maybe just blurting it out might work best. It was kind of McKay’s own strategy with the truth. 

“You know, McKay, I like you. A lot. You’re smart, you care more than you let on, and you’re *always* straight up with the unvarnished truth. I never have to guess how you feel about something. You know? I may have all these new gnarly shaman powers, but it feels a bit… intrusive, to just ignore someone’s privacy by reaching in for how they feel. So I appreciate that you don’t ever make anyone do that.”

Startled, alarmed, and suddenly terrified, McKay just stared at him. 

“I’m already bonded, to John!”

“Of course you are.”

“So this… this isn’t flirting, is it? You’re not making a move on me?”

“Oh hell no! I… I… I don’t really know how to flirt… I don’t think… was I flirting? I didn’t mean to! I can’t… I don’t even… It’s too soon to… I’m not ready.” He struggled just to slow down his panicked breathing, even as McKay tentatively reached out to rub small circles on his back. It took a few minutes, and a few of the other shamans glanced over, then left the two of them to cope on their own. With one deep, slow, breath, Tony thought he had himself in hand again. “No. Not flirting. I just thought I’d make it as easy on you to tell what I’m feeling and thinking as you make it for me.”

“Oh… Oh, well then… I don’t really know if you’re flirting either. I’ve never done it… I don’t think… I leave all that sort of stuff to my sentinel. He’s a stone flirt… he denies it, of course, but there isn’t an island in the Carib Chain where he hasn’t broken hearts when he tells them no, he’s got a bond-mate, thanks very much. He says he never sees it coming, but…”

Tony could feel it, it was pulsing from the man, probably a lot stronger than he realized. Although Rodney prided himself on not caring what others thought, or if he’s ostracized… he supposed his sentinel must like him, a little… but maybe that was just the biological instincts and imperatives forcing a sentinel to choose a guide and bond…? He was deeply insecure about how John would feel about him if he weren’t a shaman.

Somehow, Tony didn’t think he should touch that sore point. 

“Daniel says we’re a bit clue-resistant where people are concerned.”

“Daniel’s one to talk…”

“Yeah, he includes himself in that. And Spencer.”

“Reid? No… no, I think he’s wrong there. It’s just Reid reacts to people from a theoretical perspective… but he’s made a study of human behavior, enough to write books on the subject… I think it was in self-defense, mostly, as another outsider looking in. Gene Orphan, you know? Me, I was cut off because of my intellect… you because of… well, everything. But Reid got pro-active and made it a study, how to read people, how to manage them so he didn’t get attacked all the time. He’s the one you should ask about strategies to get people to lay off making you train.”

“Hunh… yeah. Maybe I will. So Rodney… what are you doing?” 

“Oh… special project… we’re going to need it up and running as soon as possible, I think. Sam Carter and Reid had some ideas I think will improve functionality… I’m just trying to work them into my plan.”

“Hey, cool. Can I help?”

“Uh… I don’t really think so…” Rodney was frowning, confused, part of that same insecurity, wondering more when someone seemed to like him, than when they turned their backs and walked away in disgust for his blunt tactlessness. 

Tony shrugged. Still trying to find a way to make a solid connection with his fellow shaman. Spiny quills and all.

“I’m not flirting, swear, but I really do like you, you know.”

Those lightning-fast fingers slowed and stopped, hovering over the keyboard. 

Tony sighed. He hadn’t wanted to get into old wounds, but... Blair said it would be good for him. To talk about it... some of it, anyway. 

“Senior, my father, Anthony DiNozzo Senior, likes to give parties. He can show off for his Officer Elite friends... score points, maybe... invites not just the Officers, but all the old Lantean families... sometimes even the odd Gene Orphan or first gen, just to underline how freakin’ above them he is...”

“Yes, well, our dear Procurement Officer has always been an asshole.”

Tony chuckled, liking that. “Yeah... yeah he has. But there was this one party... he invited all the Lantean ranking elite, to show off his brain-dead son, and the one party-trick I had. He caught me once, you see, playing the piano my mother left behind... so I couldn’t pretend I didn’t play it, after that, and he let me get away with it. Ducky told him it wasn’t an uncommon phenomenon, that an otherwise feeble-brained person should have one exceptional skill... I actually think Ducky knew more about me all along than he ever told anyone... anyway, dear old dad was making a show, drumming up interest, for who wanted dibs on my reproductive potential.”

Rodney frowned, nodding his head. “I think I remember that party.”

“I thought maybe you would. You went off on a rant in front of everyone about what a terrible person Senior was, how he shouldn’t have custody of a half-dead goldfish, much less another human being, and obviously that was a flaw in City programming that he would hunt down and deal with immediately… and then you stormed out.”

“Well... of course I did. It was a pretty lame party anyway, and none of those stuck up idiots wanted me there. I could feel their contempt just oozing out of them… Hunh. I guess I was beginning to get flashes of shaman empathy even then.”

Tony nodded. “I have no doubt... I had been finding it particularly challenging that day, not getting up and punching Senior in the face… which would have been a very bad idea, and totally given me away… and I honestly and truly appreciated the *only* Lantean *ever* to stand up for me. So when, the next day, ‘someone’ tried to poison you with citrus and you emerged shaman… I was kinda afraid that was because of me. Because you stood up for me at the party.”

This startled Rodney. “You think it was because I challenged Senior?” 

“Yup.” 

“And here, all this time, I thought it was Kavanagh being a jealous twerp...”

“Oh, it was. But he was put up to it by Senior. I hunted all through the surveillance tapes for proof, and found Senior handing Kavanagh the lemon, then pointing to your desk, and the lunch you’d left unguarded. I saw him doctor your sandwich. But by that time you were already safely off the City, and… I had secrets to keep. Sorry…”

“No! No, I appreciate you telling me, actually. One less mystery in the world. Never a bad thing. And yeah, leaving Atlantis might have hurt… but not all the corrupt assholes on her.”

“Word.”

Å 

Rounding Cape Stormy, and following the coastal line north, a high craggy ridge of mountain peaks formed the backdrop. Tall snow-covered peaks in the distance lined the sky, the lower slopes lost in purple mists. What coastline Tony had seen from the *Puddle Jumper* was covered in dense forests of tall, dark green pines and evergreens. This part of the mainland saw frequent heavy rains, in spite of warmer moderating temperatures from the ocean currents of Morrigan’s Sea. Further inland, Blair told him, the lower elevations were mostly dense rain-forest, almost jungle conditions.

Soon enough, they neared Rainier, the capitol of Novelle’s second largest province. 

The population of Cascade, the whole province, was no more than thirty thousand. Of those, about a third lived in the main capital and port of Rainier, which was about the same size as Cheyenne. Another settlement further north, almost as large, surrounded the bay of Seacouver Sound. The rest led mostly a rustic, isolated existence in far-flung farms and villages. 

Some were fishing communes, clustered on deep fjord inlets, protected coves with enough high ground to keep them above reach of any goa’uld hosting intrusions. The river valleys to the south were filled with fruit orchards and fields of vegetables. 

There were many communities spread all over the mountain range Highlands, mostly herders living in heather-covered glens, dales and clustered around the dark, bottomless lochs. They kept flocks of sheep and alpacas for wool, goats for milk and meat, and llamas as beasts of burden. There were horses in the province, but because of the few roads or accessible trails through the forests and mountains, llamas were far more useful and practical as pack animals. There wasn’t much risk from goa’uld hosting incursions that far from the sea, as most of the fresh-water streams tumbled down waterfalls and rapids that no goa’uld larvae could swim past, in either direction, and survive. Even the salmon runs, manmade ladders to assist in the annual salmon spawning, were built so as to make it impossible for goa’uld to take advantage, where the much larger, more athletic adult salmon were well able to make the necessary leaps. And, by the way, salmon were also predators on the goa’uld population.

The main local industries were logging, hunting and fishing, with the highland pastures of sheep and goat herds, and cottage industry carding, spinning and weaving of wool. They were rightly famed for their fisheries and aquaculture, and their wide variety of woven woolen textiles. The main Craft Guilds taught weaving, carpentry and ship-building. They built smaller boats too, canoes, kayaks, more easily portable for traversing the interior wilderness and navigating the larger upland lakes and rivers. Skiffs with high gunwales were built for the many off-shore fishing enterprises, specializing in aqua-culture of various kinds. Some fish pens were set up as lures to draw in the few goa’uld larvae that ventured this far north, and the traps of shoreline-hugging weirs made of poles and netting. Captured schools off goa’uld drew in many predator fish: tuna, salmon, cod, lion-heads, tiger-stripes, all of them valuable edible species, easily smoked or salted as prized delicacies even the Lanteans were starved for. 

The main gem of Rainier was the Enviro that had been settled on the flat flood-plain beside the port town. Like the one in Cheyenne, it had been rebuilt over the two centuries since Landing, from steel and plastics to stone and wood. This one had also become a giant greenhouse and food store, as well as emergency sanctuary for the populace. 

In the foothills behind the town stood the Cascade Sanctuary, the retreat and school for shamans and sentinels, a stone-and-log mansion with carefully laid out cabins and barracks buildings, manicured grounds, and its own vegetable garden. When they became Primes, Jim Ellison had taken over the sentinel training, while Blair assumed management of the shaman school and the Sanctuary. 

The original Sanctuary was established in the early years after Landing, as the need became obvious and urgent, to get the newly-manifesting sentinels and surfacing shamans trained up in their skills. The facility had floated from place to place, under the direction of the current Prime Pairs, wherever they were based. But the last three Primes had all been from Cascade, so the Sanctuary was semi-permanent now. Besides students, and those seeking refreshers or advanced courses, there were also visits from those seeking a bond-mate or partner and hadn’t found anyone suitable in their own communities, so there was also ample temporary accommodations made available. 

The protections in Rainier, designed to defend against the goa’uld, were very different from those of Cheyenne. Mostly due to a very different topography. For instance, the wide sheltered bay would not allow for a lock system, so the harbor docking piers were raised bridges that extended over extensive tidal mud-flats, equipped with swing cranes and block-and-tackle to lift large loads. Cargo ships, like *Puddle Jumper*, were anchored out in the wide bay, and small rafts were used to transport cargo to the pier platforms, or bring it out to the larger vessels, towed by oar-and-pole ferry tugs with higher-sitting protected decks. There were times of the year when flooding or high tides would cover the delta flats, and that was typically when the goa’uld would arrive for hosting season. But there were trenches and weirs set up for those occasions, and the locals banded together to net and spear any larvae found outside the various traps. With the shaman school, there were always lots of students to practice seeking out their small parasitical enemy.

Å 

Once the ferry came alongside the *Puddle Jumper*, Jim and Blair were greeted by two people, their Guardian Team. The tall dark-skinned man, Simon Banks, was their vanguard, the brunette woman with the upland Cascade accent was Megan O’Connor, Guardian Team tech. 

“About time you got home!” Simon barked out gruffly. “Was about to go and hunt you both down. Just to see what trouble Sandburg got himself into *this* time.”

“Hey! So little faith?” Blair protested with a grin.

“Sure, lots of faith… in your supernatural ability to find trouble!”

“He’s got you there, Chief,” Jim smirked. 

“Sandy!” called out O’Connor. “Get your arse down here for a hug! And tell us what took you so long. It wasn’t just a new shaman to look after, was it?”

“Well, there was a little bit of a goa’uld hosting attack in Cheyenne, but…”

“I might have known!” Simon raged. 

“Hey! Not my fault.”

The good-natured raillery continued all the way into the town proper. Which was surrounded by stone-work walls, of course, with a wide stone-paved avenue all around. The Alphas, Tony and Don Eppes, and Ronon and Teyla too, had all been invited to spend the night at the Sanctuary, and had taken Blair up on his hospitality. 

John Sheppard, seeming a bit impatient, collared Simon while they were still walking up to the school. 

“You found anyone with a Gene yet?” he asked. 

Simon grimaced. “Not sure. There’s rumors that there are a few up north, around Seacouver Sound, but you know how hard it is to get anyone to admit to anything that might get them shipped to Atlantis.”

John shook his head. “You know you have to find one before…”

“Yeah yeah. I’m on it.”

Tony frowned, wondering what that was all about. He glanced at Don, who was the other member of the party sort of on the outside looking in… but his bland expression indicated that he had some idea what Sheppard was talking about. Something they needed a Gene carrier for? It was the first time he realized neither Jim nor Blair actually had the ATA. They were both such… elemental forces, strong, charismatic, steadfast, even without it.

Since Rainier was the training center for shamans and sentinels both, Tony kind of expected there to be a lot of un-bonded sentinels around. But as he walked through the busy grounds of the Sanctuary, he saw many of those gathered were neither. Blair had mentioned they trained guides and healers as well… both were required skill sets needed by shamans. 

Some students had casually paired up, new sentinels with trainee guides or shamans, but mostly, the bonds seemed… light. Temporary. Assigned partnerships, rather than anything… sturdier. Very few had the soul-deep connection he sensed in the Alpha Pairs. But, according to Blair, it was something every sentinel and every shaman aspired to. Tony had agreed, but as far as he was concerned, that was nothing unique to the gifted among them. Didn’t *everyone* want a soul-mate to join them on their path in life?

At least here, with a few sentinel instructors hanging around watchfully, and their Alpha Prime stalking through the grounds, Tony wasn’t feeling so crowded, as he had been a few times in Cheyenne. Noticed? Stared at? Yes, certainly, but not crowded. 

He got a… strange vibe from many of the shaman trainees on the premises. As though… they weren’t quite… cooked yet. There was just something missing in each one. The ones on mediation mats, and the ones going through the different katas Teyla and the others had shown him, they felt… closest, but still, not there yet. He frowned at them, head tilted to the side. 

Blair approached, studying him. “You have some questions, Tony?”

“Um… some of these are shaman students?”

“Yup.”

“But… they’re not… there yet?”

Blair nodded with a sad smile. “You’ve heard us say that sentinels are born, but shamans are made. With sentinels, you either have enhanced senses, or you don’t. If you don’t, you have to have the latent genetic predisposition to even have a chance of manifesting. But shamans are a different kettle of fish altogether. Everyone, every human and Magical, has the *potential* to walk the path. But it’s a choice, not something coded in our DNA. There are a lot of skills we can teach someone who dedicates themselves to the shaman path. Things like meditation, healing, medicines, psychology, different kinds of therapy techniques for counselling… things everyone can learn, human and Magical alike. Although some are better suited than others, based on personality, aptitude and inclination. But what actually *makes* a true shaman is the ability to reach the Spirit Plane. And that takes certain kinds of experience, a rite of passage, an initiation crisis of some kind. It takes both to make a shaman. The learned skills, and the initiation rite of passage. That’s why we’re so rare. Anyone *could* become a shaman, but not many actually *do* cross that bridge. 

“And it is a bridge. A bridge between the waking tangible world, and that blue jungle of the Spirit. The best way to explain it, I guess, is to say you have to have stood on two worlds, become your own bridge between two opposing realities, before you can access the Spirit Plane at will.”

“Two worlds?”

“In your case, and mine, it was Life and Death. We Crossed Over, and came back, bringing with us a sense of that other side, and therefore an altered perspective. For most, it’s sickness and health, after a brush with some kind of serious and life-threatening illness. For some it’s transcending gender, to live as male-and-female, instead of male-or-female. And then there’s madness and sanity. But to go mad, and come back, is really *really* rare. Not to mention dangerous, and tends to make shamans who are a little bit on the unstable side. Which is not good. But they also have the best ability to transcend accepted physical reality. It’s maybe the easiest bridge to emulate, with psycho-active drugs of various kinds… peyote, cannabis, ayahuasca, stuff like that. We’re really careful with them, to be safe… sometimes that works, when a student shaman is deep in a meditation trance, and the drug allows them to expand their mental and emotional awareness.”

Tony gave Blair a dubious lifted eyebrow at that one. Blair held up a hand and said, “I know, I know, man. But it’s traditional. I try and discourage it when I can, but when all other paths fail… it’s a last resort for someone who just can’t seem able to take that last step, and is determined to make that choice.”

“And maybe there’s a reason for that? For it being so difficult for them? Like… maybe they shouldn’t?”

“And mostly you’re right. I turn those people away, give ‘em a healer diploma, and wish them luck in the rest of their life’s journey. But for some… past trauma can make it difficult for some, and they actually *need* the push, in order to heal themselves. In those cases, if they succeed, they actually make stronger shamans. Because they’ve ‘been there’ and ‘done that’ in their personal lives. Then I approve it, with reservations, and I participate personally.”

Tony nodded. Thinking about it, Tony supposed it made sense that not everyone could, or even wanted, to take the final steps to surface. Now he was looking for it, he could pretty much tell who was content to remain a guide, and learn to be partners with their sentinels, and those who were hoping to surface. He certainly knew who had already emerged on the path, and were learning to control and build their skills. 

Then he stopped, and turned wide eyes on Blair. “Diploma? I need a diploma in this shaman stuff?”

Blair began with a giggle, and dissolved into guffaws at Tony’s frustrated expression.

Å 

The Chief Science Officer of Atlantis, Dr. Radek Zelenka, was known to be fairly oblivious to external stimulation when he was involved in his work. The delicate and small mechanism he was dealing with was a vital component to the City’s long-range scanners, which hadn’t actually been operational in generations. The City had been nudging him to get it repaired and up-and-running for some time. And before that, Rodney McKay had been Chief Science Officer, and *he* had insisted this particular system should be a priority. So Radek felt a certain urgency in this work. Especially since he had given up on the Captain signing off on having the FS system just construct the necessary replacement parts. 

So it was a while before he registered that the silence of the labs had been interrupted by a series of repressed snickers… and then a much closer huff of impatience. 

The huff came from the far end of his work table. When he looked up, blinking behind his small round-lensed glasses, he saw three sets of near-identical bright green eyes staring back at him. For the tallest of the three, there was also black hair tied into pig-tails and held precariously in place by bright pink ribbons, a cute button nose, and baby-rounded cheeks accented by adorable dimples, chin resting on the back of little hands perched on the table edge. The middle one, brown hair cut into a curly bob, just rested her perky nose above the table, while the smallest of the three, brown hair buzzed military-short, had to pull himself up on his tiptoes with sticky fingers whitened on the table border in order to peer over the top.

Radek set down his component and sighed, rubbing his fingers under his glasses. 

“You know, I’m fairly certain you three should be in school right now. Why are you here, instead?”

The tallest huffed again and scowled. It was insanely cute. “They’re teaching us to *read*!” she complained bitterly. “We *know* how to read! And they’re giving us *stoopid* stuff to read, Doctor Radek! All… spot run, run spot run… *stoopid*! So we came to ask you for something *interestin’* to read, instead.”

Radek nodded, not surprised. These three mites were showing promise of possessing formidable minds. They already had a daunting ability to escape their care-givers and teachers any time they wanted, and get into any part of the City… they certainly hadn’t been authorized for the labs, although that hadn’t stopped them before. After speaking to their mothers, Radek had convinced the families to let them spend time in the labs, since they were so often drawn here anyway. Curiosity was always to be encouraged, and Radek knew they were bored with the regular school curriculum. The City had already been tutoring all three, and two more gifted but even younger children, to a level far beyond their age and grade-levels. 

The City was displaying an interest in these particular children that their mothers found disturbing… Seven, six and five years old, respectively, they shouldn’t have come into contact with each other… except that Atlantis seemed to have introduced them, and told them more about themselves than their mothers wanted them to know. 

For instance, the fact that all three, and two more kids currently too young for school, were all the offspring of one Anthony DiNozzo Junior. And once they discovered they were siblings, it was all but impossible to keep them from gathering together at every opportunity.

“Well, let’s see now… something interesting for you to do… Doctor Charlie is busy just now on a project I need him on. One of the desalinization tanks is clogged, and he has a maintenance team in the lower decks to clear it out. Kate, you like to watch such operations, correct?”

“Ooh, yes, Doctor Radek!” Little Kate, the middle of the trio, hopped up and down excitedly. 

“Tell the City you want to go to Desalinization Three. I’ll call Doctor Charlie and tell him to expect you. No deviating, now! Go straight there.”

“Yes, thanks *awfully* Doctor Radek!” and she raced out the door. Radek’s second call over the comms was to Kate’s mother, SFD tech Paula Cassidy, to let her know where her enterprising daughter was. The school didn’t need to know, if they weren’t competent enough to be aware of a student’s absence. So much the worse when one of the teaching staff was Wendy Miller, Abby’s mom. 

“Can’t I go too?” little Timmy asked, pouting, so adorable Radek had to sternly keep his expression from exploding into a grin. 

“No, Timothy, you are too small and might fall into the hoppers by mistake. I’ll get Doctor Amita to set you up with a new game. Atlantis has many to choose from. You like the fantasy role-playing ones, no?” 

Timmy nodded enthusiastically, but he frowned and reached out to touch the device Radek had set down. 

“What’s this, Doctor Radek?”

The CSO snatched it out of sticky little fingers. “Ah ah ah… what did I tell you about touching things without permission?”

“Ummm… I’m not to do it? But what is it? What’s it do? Why are you poking it?”

With a sigh, Radek explained. “This is a component for the City’s long range sensors. It’s broken, and we’re not sure if it can be repaired. We don’t appear to have the correct materials to replace the internal crystals. Without this, we can’t get the sensors back online, and the City insists she needs them.”

Abby, the eldest of DiNozzo Junior’s children, frowned mightily. “But can’t you just… make a new one?”

“That would require us to turn on the Fabrication System, which would be a great drain on our power reserves.” He glanced over his shoulder at the monitor mounted on one wall. Counting down the months, ten-days, days, and hours, left until the City’s power ran out. Not years. They didn’t even have one full year left on the count-down. It measured the amount of power remaining in the all-but-depleted last active Zero Point Module power cell. “I have made the request, several times, but this project is determined to be of low priority, and I am denied access.”

“But…” Abby frowned thoughtfully. “My Aunt Violet got a new dress for the Inag’I’shun party. And Cap’n Kinsey got a new tablet, even though his old one wasn’t broke, and my Uncle Jasper says all the new SFD recruits got pretend guns last ten-day to practice on. And all of them came out of the fab’icatin’ center.”

Ah yes. The Millers were an old Lantean family. Violet, unlike Wendy, hadn’t been smart enough for a teaching position, technically a part of the Science Division… so she had been made team lead of a housekeeping team in the Maintenance and Service Division, Not the most prestigious assignment… Jasper Miller was a Security Force Division trainee. Of course they would get preferential treatment, no questions asked. 

Timmy nodded. “And my granddad got a new office chair made for him last ten-day in the fab’icatin’ center.”

Timmy’s granddad was Rene Benoit, the Chief Ordnance Officer. Radek wasn’t sure how a new office chair counted as Ordnance of any kind, much less high-priority essential equipment… 

Radek shook his head in disgust. Of course. If you had enough pull, anything you wanted could be made a priority… no matter how petty. But not, apparently, vital necessary replacement parts the City actually *requested* and must therefore *need*. The Captain claimed long range sensors were unnecessary. They’d got along just fine without them for almost a hundred years, why would they suddenly need them now? But, with only a weak ATA-D Gene, barely enough to lock a door or run a life-sign detector, Kinsey didn’t feel the pressure from the City to bring that system back online. 

Radek glanced around him at all the other scientists working in the main lab… all of them had heard the children. All of them were frustrated, even enraged, at the obstructions put in the way of them doing their jobs. The most basic requirements, for tools, replacement parts, necessary materials, had to go through lengthy requisition processes… only to be turned down for one reason or another. Their Chief Procurement Officer, who should have facilitated all requests from the Science Division as a matter of utmost priority, didn’t seem to understand, or perhaps care, about the need, and instead was a bottleneck they found it difficult to get around. If Chief DiNozzo refused a request, it was highly unlikely Kinsey would countermand his decision.

And both those men were no better than criminals, as corrupt as the day was long.

Hence the pandering to every stupid request from the old Lantean families in the Officer Elite, for any useless luxury or passing fancy they wanted, while the City fell to ruin around them.

It was a situation fraught with inequality and abuse, especially hard for the Science and Medical Divisions to endure. Those Divisions in particular tended to be heavily staffed with Gene Orphans, like himself. And that was a stigma that few were allowed to ignore. 

Worse yet, for those in this lab, was the knowledge that even what resources they now had would soon be gone. The display Charlie Epps had created, tacked to the wall over their heads and in plain view of all, was a sobering warning. Once that number reached zero, the City would be, literally, dead in the water. No lights. No transport cabinets. No FS. No Shield. The least storm would rush over the lower piers. The pumps would stop running, too, for the desalinization system that provided fresh potable water, the sewage recycle, the pumps that kept the lower basement levels from flooding… it would all grind to a halt. Those systems with their own independent power cells and active crystals would run for a little longer, like the doors, tablets, weapons, many medical and science devices like the life-signs detectors. The few active shuttles still in service would only run as long as their last re-charge did. 

Radek held various emergency evacuation plans, ordered by Rodney McKay, drafted by Spencer Reid, and had assigned Miko Kusanagi and Larry Fleinhardt to make sure they were all kept current. Rodney, in his time as CSO, had even identified a suitable fall-back alpha site, where they could set up temporary shelters for the five thousand occupants of the City. Kinsey hadn’t listened when Radek tried to explain the necessity for an emergency plan. But Radek wasn’t willing to let it go, and kept pushing it at his superiors. Vance seemed a little more receptive… Reid had been perceptive enough to create various versions of his plans, prioritizing actions, depending on how little warning they had… Radek was thinking there wouldn’t be much, when the sheer desperation of their situation broke through even the blind self-deluded denial of the Officer Elite. 

Well, he had done all he could. Reid’s final, and worst case, solution, had been for Radek himself to grab a culling buffer, sweep up all the City inhabitants in one go, and steal a shuttle. It would leave them all with no more than the clothes on their backs… but it would at least save all their population. Too many innocent lives might be forfeit otherwise. He glanced with a sad smile at Abby and Timmy. 

Radek said, “Go see Doctor Amita, Timmy. She’ll set you up with a suitable game. We have one we created on how to build a settlement from scratch. You might like that one.” And the little boy, no matter how young, did seem to have a talent with strategic thinking. His mother, Jeanne Benoit, a trauma specialist in the Medical Division, thoroughly approved of any time he spent in the labs, proud of her son’s smarts. Radek sent a text to her, just to let her know where he was. She was the most likely of the mothers to come looking for her little one, incensed that the school had lost track of him… *again*. 

“What about me, Doctor Radek?” Abby asked, a little anxious, as those huge, shining green DiNozzo eyes looked pleadingly up at him.

“Well, let’s see…” Radek looked around, snorted as Dr. Kavanagh ducked to avoid his attention… as if he would allow that cretin to look after such a promising young mind as Abby. One of the very few born-Lanteans to make it into the advanced sciences, he had all the arrogant entitlement of a Rodney McKay, without the actual talent and brilliance to justify his high opinion of himself. Plus he was an insufferable jack-ass. 

“Ah, there. You’re in luck, Abby. Doctor Carson Beckett is running a lab test today with our equipment, since the unit in the Infirmary is inoperable. We haven’t been authorized to make the replacement parts for that, either… Doctor Carson! Could you use an assistant over there?”

The dark-haired man looked up from his work, blinking, much as Radek had when unexpectedly interrupted. Then he grinned at the child at Radek’s side, bouncing excitedly on her toes. Carson was a dear soul… he was Elper-born, but had successfully hidden his ATA Gene from the recruitment testers. A citizen of the Cascade Highlands, he had chosen to take the shaman path… until a goa’uld attack on Rainier had brought a Lantean shuttle with an SFD troop to assist. In the emergency, Carson had accidentally revealed his gene ability, by picking up the wrong weapon… and using it in defense of a pocket of trapped children. They rated him a strong ATA-B, but Radek suspected he had fudged the testing in some way, certain the man possessed another, rare, ATA-A super-gene. Carson was also one of those extremely rare people who had been trained in shaman healing… and then as a medical doctor on Atlantis. He had been unable, for some reason, to take the last step to surfacing as a shaman… and so he was stuck on Atlantis. Chief Medical Officer Dr. Mallard appreciated the rare talents and perspective Carson brought to the table… not too many others did. But most of the Medical Divisions relied heavily on the technology Atlantis supplied them, to the exclusion of all else. So when the clock ran out on the City, all that would be gone. Radek and Ducky both recognized that they would desperately need Carson’s skills and knowledge base then, for the inevitable and painful transition. 

“Ah, Abby, lass! Yes, I could certainly use an assistant. This should certainly interest you. One of our ladies has *very* recently become pregnant, and is anxious that we run a full genome on the fetus. I am testing the DNA from this amniocentesis sample right now…”

Ah. Radek knew about this. Intel Officer Ziva David had received artificial insemination from a sample supplied by Chief Procurement Officer Anthony DiNozzo Senior. Everyone was certain the sample was from his son. It was a consolation prize after the marriage contract between Ziva David and DiNozzo Junior failed to… consummate. Which meant that Abby would be getting another half-sibling in the fullness of time.

“Oooh! Yes! Is it a new brother or sister for me?” Abby asked excitedly.

Oh, well then… Carson glanced sharply up at the Chief Science Officer, but Radek could only shrug. 

“A sister, lass,” Carson acknowledged. “Officer David has already named her, Talia.”

“Oooh, is that the ATA Gene? Tali can speak to the City, too?”

“Yes… as a matter of fact… when she’s born, and old enough, anyway. It’s a strong Gene, just like yours, lass.”

Abby put out a finger to stroke the small glass vial. “Hi, Tali. I’m your sister Abby. We’re all family, now. We’re gonna have such fun together…” The little girl frowned, obviously having deep thoughts. Carson smiled as he gave her a fond pat on the head. He couldn’t wait to hear what she was dwelling on… whatever it was, he knew it would be a surprise.

“She says you know where my Daddy is now.” A little finger pointed up, to indicate ‘she’ was the City, and not the sample in the vial. That would just be… creepy, considering Talia David was no more than a few hundred fetal cells at the moment.

And yes, that was a surprise. Not that the City spoke to the precocious little girl, as she spoke to him too. But the subject of Abby’s father had never come up before. He hesitated, wondering what he could, or should, say. But the sharp little girl was on that pause in an instant. She sighed heavily. 

“Nobody wants to talk about my Daddy. Not even her. How come? Mommy gets mad when I do, so I don’t. Everybody gets mad when I ask, so I don’t. And she only tells me little things. She used to show me, sometimes, pictures of him, when he was smiling, when he was staring out at the ocean, or reading, or when he was little like me and running around and playing… but she doesn’t any more. She says he’s gone away so he can be happy. Is he happy?”

Carson sat down and invited Abby into his lap. This was going to be a conversation *someone* should have had with her a while ago, and if her own family wouldn’t, then… and letting an artificial intelligence be her only source of information… just seemed wrong on all kinds of levels. Carson was feeling enough guilt where Tony DiNozzo was concerned… he suspected a lot of people were. 

“I think he’s happy, yes. You know he became a shaman, right? That’s a wonderful thing to be. Only a few special people are capable of it, and your daddy is one, lass. But that means he had to go away to learn what he needs, to be a good shaman. He’s with the Alpha Shaman Prime, Blair Sandburg, right now. I know Blair, and he’s the very best shaman in the world. He’ll see that your daddy is happy.”

“Is Blair nice?”

“He’s *very* nice, yes.” 

There was absolutely no doubt in Carson’s mind on that score. When the Lanteans had come to take him away, Blair had promised him he could return, as soon as he surfaced… that the universe had a way of making things right, or seeing people got to be where they were supposed to be. The mystical side of being a shaman was one of the things Carson had had the most trouble learning, and Blair suggested, might be the reason he had not been able to reach the Spirit Plane on his own. But Blair thought, maybe, Atlantis had something to teach Carson, something he needed to learn, before he could surface. So Carson had swallowed his fears and insecurities, and thrown himself into learning Lantean medicine, as he had in learning shamanistic herb-lore and healing principals.

“Why is everyone mad when I ask about my daddy?”

Carson sighed, hugging the little girl close. “We all have different reasons, lass. Some people are angry that he left us. He has a strong Gene, like you and I do, and that’s very rare. They think everyone with a Gene should be here, on Atlantis. That’s why they took me from my home in Cascade, and my own shaman lessons with Blair. But shaman powers can be a mite dangerous if they aren’t properly trained, so he had to go and train with Blair.”

“Is that why my mommy is mad?”

“I can’t really say about that, lass… I think your mommy doesn’t like to think about your daddy at all… maybe she wants to think you’re all her own, not anyone else’s.” 

And, as far as Carson could see, all of Tony DiNozzo’s ‘wives’ carried some degree of guilt, that their somewhat demeaning and shameful contracts had been their choice, but not his. No wonder Wendy Miller and the others tried their best to forget Tony even existed. If they had been offered Ziva David’s option of eliminating the ‘personal touch’ altogether, no doubt they all would have taken it. To them, he had been no more than a sperm delivery system, anyway… and it had been a bloody shock to everyone on the City to discover the lad had been hiding an intelligent, fully aware and desperately wounded soul all this time.

“But you’re not mad when I talk about my daddy. You’re sad.”

“I am very sad about your daddy. I, and a lot of other people, feel like we failed your daddy. I wouldn’t be surprised if the City feels she failed him, too. He was kept locked up, you know, almost all of his life, locked up and alone, and he felt he had to hide who he was, from everyone, because… because he wasn’t *safe* otherwise. He wasn’t free, and no one, *no one* ever tried to help him. And I feel very sad about that.”

Tears appeared in those big green DiNozzo eyes. “Is he ever coming home, my daddy? Will I ever get to meet him? Will he love me one day?”

“Oh lass… your daddy loves you very much. He always has, and always will. He loves all of you, you and Kate and Timmy and Jimmy and baby Ellie. Just like he’ll love Tali, when the wee bairn arrives. And I hope… I hope that, one day, he’ll be able to meet you in person. Then he’ll show you just how much he loves you all.”

Abby sighed and nodded. “That will be a great day.”

Å


	9. Chapter 9: "Oh boy! Going home in style!"

Å 

There was a meditation area on one of the Rainier Sanctuary’s wide porches, facing the setting sun, with the mountains behind and the wide blue sea ahead. Tony spent a lot of time there, especially in the early evenings, since it was a favorite hang-out of Blair’s. John Sheppard had agreed to remain at anchor in the Rainier harbor for a ten-day, maybe more, to see if Tony did as well as they all expected with his training. If he did, then Tony and Don would be carried by *Puddle Jumper* to their next Port of Call. Rodney was just as glad of the excuse to work on some secret project of his with Cascade Guardian Team tech Megan O’Connor. The other sentinels and shamans were all taking advantage of the Sanctuary facilities for training, meditation and sparring practice. They also planned to teach the DiNozzo method of dealing with a goa’uld school by ‘stunning them with shamany goodness’, as Willow called it.

Like the kata exercises to temper the physical body, Blair was teaching Tony the meditation exercises to massage the brain. The new shaman seemed to have an innate talent with both forms of self-control. It was Blair’s stated opinion that the City had facilitated that, in some ways. She had been feeding Tony whatever information she possessed on shamans for years, and leading him through some of the known exercises and skills training. He had certainly been thoroughly coached on the herbal medicine and healing techniques they had to teach the students who appeared on their shores. 

The other provinces sent all sorts of their people to Rainier for training at the Sanctuary, not just the newly manifested sentinels and newly surfaced shamans, or shaman hopefuls. Re-training after injury, refresher courses, advanced studies when needed… all were offered here. A sentinel having difficulties with their senses, a shaman suffering some kind of trauma, either with separation issues from a broken bond… The Sanctuary was their refuge while they healed from whatever ailed them. It was also one of two main training grounds for militia volunteers. There was the Academy at Quantico in Pastureland, but also this one at the Sanctuary, although it specialised more for sentinels, who needed training more geared to their sensory skills. And anyone who expressed an interest was sent for standard guide or healer training, valued, even essential skills in any community. There were often guest lecturers and trainers on the campus, to teach in various subjects and techniques. Teal’c and Bra’tac of Chulak came many times to demonstrate and teach their Jaffa-style martial arts, as Teyla did with her bantos rods. Bantos was a very popular form for all of their students to learn, whether for defense, physical conditioning, or as a meditation ritual. 

Tony had been rather shocked to discover how few of the students were actually there to become shamans.

Blair turned Tony over to his instructors, for testing on the various categories of skill and knowledge base he would need to be a fully qualified shaman, if only to figure out where his gaps were. He didn’t have many, as it turned out. Understandably, they all had to do with interacting directly with people… and more specifically, with sentinels. Since it was likely, if not expected or guaranteed, that he would find a sentinel to bond with, if only in a marginal way, as a working partner in the field, that was one thing that Tony needed to learn and practise before Blair would unleash him on an unsuspecting world. 

It was Blair who chose Don Eppes to be his practice partner. Don was reluctant, but the bossy little shaman wouldn’t hear of any excuses, and steam-rollered over them both. 

“Don’t be silly, you guys. Bonds don’t just happen by accident, you know. They take work. Both parties have to be into it, consenting adults, and right now, neither of you are consenting to anything more than a few practice rounds of guiding, and maybe a little sparring. Come on, Don. You’ve worked with guide partners before, both shamans and not. You had to do that in training, and I know you have a few people in your militia you rely on when things get stressful. So you’re not breaking any promises to anyone by getting some time in with Tony. He’s going to have to learn to work with a variety of sentinels, whether he’s bonded to them or not, whether he ever chooses a mate or not. So both of you, get with the program here.”

They started by going through the katas with the other students, both sentinels and proposed shamans. Syncing up bodies and movements, breathing and heart-beats, was the most fundamental stage of building a rapport. Once attuned to each other, with a light empathic tether, they could proceed to working on a common goal. 

A class of sentinels with their assigned partners were just getting ready to go hunting in the uplands above the town, so Don and Tony were signed up to join them. It was also an exercise in wilderness survival training. Ideally, for a true test, they should be supplied with nothing more than the clothes on their backs, but Blair insisted on a minimum of essential equipment, for safety’s sake, and particularly with someone as new to it as Tony. They had minimal camping gear to carry in their back-packs: knives, rope, a blanket and canteen each, a single small pot and cups, an emergency med kit, and one kit specifically packed for shamans. Part of their gear was a book outlining the flora and fauna of the region, identifying benign, edible and medicinal from dangerous, toxic or poisonous plants and animals, as many students would not be locals. Tony had already seen much of this on the Atlantis database, and had spent the night before brushing up and studying the specifics for Cascade Province. It was a dauntingly thick book, and he envied Daniel and Spencer their quick reading speeds.

The training exercise would allow the sentinels to extend their senses to locate and track prey, and the shamans and guides would learn to assist, and work as a team. They would be gone three days, and expected to make their own shelters, and live off what they caught or harvested. Sentinel instructors would keep them within monitoring range, in case of any problems the trainees couldn’t handle on their own.

As the pairs parted company at the trail head and fanned out, headed into the forests, Don huffed and looked apologetically at Tony. 

“Sorry about this. I didn’t feel like I could say no to Blair… you know?”

Tony chuckled. “Oh, I know. He’s a force of nature, alright. And I’m sorry you got roped in… I know hunting practice is the last thing you need. But I have to admit… I… All I’ve known, my whole life, is the piers and halls of Atlantis. This… all this… *nature*… gives me the creeps.”

Don smiled reluctantly. “Well then, let’s get you up to speed on wilderness survival. It’s not so tough, you know… you just gotta watch out for the main dangers. Learn to spot triffids, noose-vines, poison dandelions, and man-eating lilies, things like that.”

Tony cocked an eye at him. “Uh-hunh… I’d suspect you were trying to scare the probie, but… I’ve read about those, and others like them, in the Atlantis databank. For some reason, she thought I ought to know. I have to wonder if maybe she isn’t just a bit pre-cognitive, along with a lot sapient.”

Å 

Tony had heard whispers from the other students around the Sanctuary campus in the past few days, calling him a ‘hot-house plant’, in reference to his background as a virtual prisoner on the City. But he was actually in pretty fair physical shape in spite of that. Atlantis had offered him ample opportunities to escape out to the deserted decks of abandoned towers and piers, to stretch his limbs, run off his stress and frustration, practice the katas and exercises she had taught him from security recordings. At one point, Atlantis had taken him to a virtual-reality play-room of some kind, loaded up various games, so he could also practice throwing, catching, dribbling, shooting hoops, batting balls, archery and marksmanship with a variety of weapons. 

Don was actually surprised at his level of endurance, which made Tony smirk at him. When he was able to pick up a rock and lob it with pretty fair accuracy at a small, hissing dragonet to scare it off their path, Don actually blinked at him.

“I guess you didn’t mean to actually hit it?”

“Hell no. When full grown, those things eat a ton of goa’uld larvae in a day. Why would I want to damage one?”

Don grinned. “Fair enough. Also, just as a future note, that one might not have left the nest yet, so there’s a possibility its mom might be around, somewhere close by. And she would show her displeasure quite strongly for us injuring her kid.”

“Note taken.” 

“So, I should have asked sooner, rather than just assuming… you as good with a weapon, or bow and arrow?”

“Better. The City taught me in one of the virtual reality game rooms. When we stop to camp tonight, I’ll see if I can make my own bow and arrows. I know the instructions… never able to do the practical. Pretty good at knife throwing, too, although I need to practice with specific blades to be sure. Each one has its own balance and quirks.”

Don shook his head and chuckled. “Okay. More fool me for falling for the Lantean helpless idiot thing.” 

“Oh, I am pretty helpless with this wilderness schtick… I can’t track to save my soul. Looking at all the canned videos and pictures and drawings in the world won’t help me recognize a real threat in the wild. And this… uneven ground thing? Yeah, I’m half afraid of tripping over every damn root out here, and breaking my ankle.”

Don out-and-out laughed. “Oh, Ian would just *love* to get his hands on you for training… he’s the best there is at all that. And just so you know, we’ve been following a game-trail, rather than trying to bash our way through the undergrowth, so that we can limit your opportunities to trip and twist something. But the down-side of an easier trail is that this is where a lot of predators like to hang out, for easy prey. So be aware.”

“Gotcha. Don’t be a sitting duck for every triffid and noose-vine out here.”

“And they *do* like to collect around game-trails just like this one, you’re right.”

Å 

Since they still had another trail meal they had brought with them, they spent the rest of that day practicing the various partnership skills. 

Don had already been through this kind of training, a few times, but without a steady guide partner to keep them up to date, he had needed refreshers over the years. But he found he needed a whole new level of competence to work with Tony. 

This handsome, if reserved, young man could harmonize with Don’s heart-beat in a moment. Whenever Don’s raised fist called for a sudden halt, he fell into an instant attentive stillness, just behind Don’s left shoulder, steadying hand on his back that seemed to permeate the sentinel in a boost of power. Don had never felt his focus so sharp, so strong, before. It was a little bit unnerving. Most of all, because it all seemed second-nature to the shaman, as if he had been doing this for years, not little more than a ten-day. 

But whenever not on alert, Tony drew back his hand, and kept a wide berth between the two of them, following in Don’s exact footsteps, as he had been warned to do. It was hard not to fill in the blanks on that one. A life-time of isolation? Touch aversion? Trust issues up the Wazoo River and back? Oh yeah, all of that, and no wonder. 

Still, the guy was a damn quick study. By early afternoon, he was tapping Don’s shoulder to get his attention, then pointing soundlessly to either a threat, a noose-vine uncoiling in the tree branches above, or an animal sign he wanted Don to take notice of. Each time Don had been aware of these already, but he liked that Tony was letting him know that he’d begun to pick this stuff up, too. He told Tony to keep on informing him, just so he could register Tony’s progress.

In fact, they were doing so well, Don decided it was time to do some real tracking. He had caught the spoor of a small wild pig crossing the game-trail they were on, still near enough that he could hear its passage in cracked twigs and rustling bushes higher up on the ridge they were following. He checked with Tony, and his partner nodded, an eager, almost feral, grin on his lips. 

Hunh, maybe add adrenaline junkie to Tony’s list of potential issues. Life as a hot-house plant must have been *boring*, quite apart from anything else.

Å 

The hunt had been a thrill, no question. Tony had felt pumped like never before, and it had taken quite an effort on his part to focus on the actual mechanics of following his partner. But, the odd thing was… it seemed… *easy*. He almost heard Don’s thoughts in his head, so that the few minimal hand signals he used were almost unnecessary. Don zigging right, him zigging left, leaping through the bushes, fallen tree trunks, jerking back suddenly when only the shadow of a half-buried deer skeleton told him a triffid was too close by, shooting out a stinger that Tony only *barely* managed to dodge… then rushing forward to keep pace with his sentinel, ready to leap when the wild pig burst out of a clump of low bushes and right into his hands. 

The pig squealed and struggled in Tony’s hold, even as he laughed, high and joyful, clutching it tight to his chest. Don was suddenly there, bending over him. Dark eyes alight and grinning.

“Congrats on your first successful hunt, Tony. But watcha gonna do now?”

Well, didn’t that just take the shine off the moment. “Oh… gotta… kill it?” He looked down at the wide frightened eyes, and managed to fake a slip. “Oops!” as the pig vanished into the undergrowth. “Sorry ‘bout that…”

Don laughed, shaking his head. “Yeah, well, we’ll call that lesson two, how to get used to the next part of being a hunter. Next time, let me take over, ‘kay? Or we’ll never eat.”

“Sure. Okay. Good call. Oh, by the way, triffid back there. It’s still working on a kill, so it hasn’t drummed up its kin, but maybe we need to get away from here.”

“Yeah, and that would also be a good call. I thought Jim and Blair had cleared them all out of this side of the mountain.”

“Yeah, well, the suckers migrate. Even I know that. Damn walking pitcher plants.”

Triffid presence was definitely something the trainers needed to know, so Don announced it loud and clear, and heard, faintly, an acknowledgement that their instructor had a lock on the location, and a team would come and deal with the problem.

Å 

Dinner was hasenpfeffer, roasted on a skewer over their little camp-fire, rather than pork, but neither man complained any. Tony might never be able to actually kill any game he caught, unless it was of a goa’uld kind, or bent on killing him first. And that was okay. No sentinel had much of a problem with that part of survival. It was ingrained in the throw-back genetic advantage they seemed to be born with. Protect your own, and eliminate all threats with extreme prejudice. And if ‘protect’ included feeding yourself and others when hungry, so be it.

But it had been a big day, a long one, and both had been on high alert from the first as they learned how to get along in the big bad wilderness. So it was just going dark when they banked the small fire, unrolled the survival blankets side-by-side, took care of body functions, and prepared to bed-down. Tony had lifted an eyebrow when Don had rolled his gear right next to Tony’s. 

“We’re out in the open, far from civilization, no walls, no natural protection,” Don explained. “I can’t be more than an arm’s length away, in case there’s trouble. We’ve already seen evidence of noose-vines, triffids and dragons. That’s more than enough threat in my opinion. I’m already going to be practicing my on-call skills… There’s a way sentinels can keep their senses on high alert awareness-mode while dozing lightly… we can’t keep it up for more than a ten-day at a time, but for a few days it’s doable. Blair says there’s something similar for shamans?”

“Yeah. I’m supposed to be in a light trance, half way between sleep and wake. I think I have the hang of it, but we’ll see if I can keep it up, and how rested I can still be in the morning.”

Tony settled himself, his breathing became regulated and even, then deepened… Don could almost feel him, withdrawing only slightly from the world, all his edges smoothing down from their day tramping through the bush. There was also a… a kind of hum, as if his partner was processing his day, reviewing all he had learned, solidifying it, building bridges to access it at need. 

Don smiled, and eased down, even as his shaman did. 

‘His shaman’… yeah, he was going to have to keep a tight rein on that kind of thought. Don was struggling to maintain a distance he knew Tony still needed, but he was getting in deeper and deeper emotionally, and that had nothing to do with their working rapport. That had only grown over the day, to something so fluid and natural, that Don had never experienced its like. And that had to be the ‘alpha’ in alpha shaman.

But he had to remember. Tony wasn’t his. Tony might never be anybody’s. Which would be a crying shame, because this guy… this smart, handsome, talented guy, who had run like a deer in the forest, had laughed joyfully at grabbing a pig, and even more joyously at letting it go… this guy was made to belong to someone who deserved such a gift.

Don just couldn’t help the sigh of hope… that he might one day be that someone.

Å 

Sleeping under the stars wasn’t so bad, Tony had thought, as the camp-fire fell into embers and ash, and the night closed in, leaving just a gap in the tree tops above, and the wheeling sparkle of the universe passing overhead. 

He had often slept out on the balconies of his rooms, comforted by the light of the City below, and the light of the stars above, seeming dimmer than now, because the City out-shone everything close. It was a little bit of peace, a little breath of freedom… however much of an illusion that was. 

But this, with the spice of pine and cedar in the air, mere suggestions of smoke lingering from their little fire, the low hush of breezes through the trees… the odd calls of night creatures, owls hooting, the high-pitched squeaks of bats, even the more distant shriek of some prey animal caught by a nocturnal predator… there was a visceral comfort to all of it, even with another too-close presence breathing softly nearby. 

None of his ‘wives’ ever slept with him. They came, spent just enough time for him to do his… husbandly duty, then they left, never giving him a backward glance. He had always been insanely relieved when they left him alone. Gibbs? Oh, yeah, that guy stayed… he shuddered and resolutely dragged his mind away from those images, breaking his trance and shoving him out into wakefulness. 

And there was the cause of his memories surging up… he jerked up, and pulled hastily away from the warm body rolling into him, the possessive arm thrown over his shoulders, the lusting leg over his thighs.

Don, too, jerked awake, sitting bolt upright, quickly assessing the situation, stretching out for the threat he could hear in Tony’s gasping breath, drumming heart, elevated temperature. Then he looked down at himself, and blushed fiery red. 

“Oh. Sorry about that. All my bed partners complain I’m a bit of an octopus snuggler… I’ll just…” and, still more than half asleep, Don shifted over, maybe an inch or two, turned his back on Tony, and collapsed back into his sentinel doze. 

It took a while for Tony to calm down from his freak-out. But, he thought the next morning, when he woke to a breakfast of berries and a cup of stewed boiled wild rose-hip tea, offered from his sentinel’s hand… nowhere near as long as it should have…

Å 

Second day, same as the first, a little bit longer, a little bit worse.

The rest they had caught the night before did help, but Tony could already tell it was an emergency response, not meant to be kept up for long. When they turned back to join the other training pairs and chaperones on morning four, he would be more than ready to sink into a full-on nap. And eat a solid breakfast of oatmeal. And a lunch of sandwiches full of fully cooked yet non-singed meat he hadn’t had to catch himself. Oh, and a shower with hot water and soap would not go amiss, either. 

Around noon, it began to rain. Apparently, as Blair had warned them, the west coast of the northern continent was prone to frequent heavy rains, almost all year round. They were just lucky it stopped and allowed the forest to dry out some by the time they were ready to make camp, so they were able to gather enough dry tinder and dead branches to get a fire going. 

Tony missed clean dry clothes most of all. But it wasn’t like they had even a change of socks with them, or there was a laundry facility anywhere in reach. Rinsing socks and underwear in a handy stream and setting them to dry by the fire overnight was the best they could do.

Yeah, City-boy Tony was not so sold on this wilderness trekking thing. 

Although, as they crawled under their blankets the second night in the wild, Tony thought he might get used to sleeping under the stars. 

Å 

Third day dawned, with an overcast sky glowering overhead, threatening more rain, and dampening their spirits a little. They were beginning to feel the lack of deep sleep tug at them. Don warned his partner to try and be extra vigilant, as their reaction times were beginning to suffer, and that was dangerous.

No triffids or dragons around, but… 

Don could smell it on the wind, at almost the same time Tony could feel it ruffling the natural aura of the forest.

They both whispered it together, under their breath so only each other could hear: “Goa’uld.” 

“Four… no, five, in human hosts,” Tony barely breathed.

Don nodded in agreement, sniffing and wincing. “Been out here a while. Ragged. Filthy. Starving. All pretty feral. Moving as a pack. Hunting.”

“Call for back-up?”

“Yeah. But the nearest help is more than a day away, even on horseback. Seems that triffid you found was part of a whole grove of them, and our instructor joined the clean-up crew. By the time back-up gets here, we could lose them. We can’t wait. The path these goa’uld are on? There’s a small shepherd co-op up there on an alpine pasture, three families, men, women, children. Can’t let them get there.”

Tony nodded grimly in agreement. This was a little more than a training exercise, now. 

He was ready for this. He had to be.

Å 

The rhythm they had developed over the previous days stood them in good stead, moving in tandem, the slightest gestures enough to coordinate their actions. Still with Don in the lead, Tony at his left shoulder, an occasional touch to steady their link. They left their game trail to cross obliquely to head off the host-pack, planning to intercept them on the deliberately cleared trail they were on.

The slope of the mountain steepened, the path, clearly beaten by regular human travel, feet, beasts of burden, cart wheels, formed a switchback road, back and forth on the grade to make the traverse easier. There was also a wide cleared border, stumps left from many felled trees, the forest kept back, to limit the other potential hazards for any travelers. So as Don and Tony reached the forest verge, cautiously down-wind and up-slope, they had an unobstructed view of the pack, approaching from below and unaware of them. 

There was one adult in the lead, stumbling oddly and propped by two stripped branches he used as canes, as if crippled in some way. In his wake followed four children. That shocked Tony a little. Goa’uld parasites almost never took children as hosts, unless there was no one, and nothing else. And a damaged adult? If they were desperate enough to take such weak and vulnerable hosts, they ‘traded up’ to a fully healthy adult at the very first opportunity. Even a large predator animal would be a preferable host to any goa’uld. Surely these should have taken more mobile, adult hosts? From the state of all five, it must have been a while since they had taken possession, too, a ten-day at the least. The adult, a middle-aged man, had graying tangled hair and beard, greasy, unwashed, scraggly, stuck with twigs, burrs, maybe even insects. He wore inside-out ill-scraped pelts, reeking so bad even Tony could smell them at a distance. 

As for the four kids? Tony’s heart ached for them. Two boys, two girls, all of them running naked, resembling animals more than humans, even if they walked on two legs. All four were covered in bloody scratches, knees, elbows, feet scabbed over, their hair also tangled and filthy. The littlest girl was no more than five years old. The little boy next to her was only a little older, mud caked everywhere, bones standing out all over his body, except for a bloated belly. No matter how good a goa’uld parasite might be at healing, they couldn’t cure starvation. The other girl was maybe ten years, also skinny and boney. 

As for the oldest of the four, the boy, he might be twelve, maybe, but scrawnier than any kid should be. His foggy eyes and erratic motions also revealed he had been a host much longer than the other kids… maybe years. Maybe a lot of years. His sun-bleached hair trailed down past his waist in a matted, felted mass. And, Tony’s empathy focussed without his quite being aware of it… he could hear it, tucked tight into a tiny, cramped corner of his own head, the wails, the jagged cries of torment. ‘I want my Dad! I want my Mom! I wanna go *home*!’

So, there was still a person inside, struggling to get free. Tony knew too well what that felt like. He *still* felt it, cried out every unguarded moment, for his mom, his life, for a home and security and love he had never known, no matter how hard Atlantis had tried to give him that. But under Senior’s thumb, or Gibbs’, or a goa’uld’s, what hope was there?

And he was resolved. 

These kids would be free. He swore it. 

He knew from his reading of the Atlantis database that it was possible… Blair had explained the theory… but he had never been anywhere near a host before. 

He could only hope. 

He tapped Don’s shoulder, and raised the bow he had made himself the first night, and pulling one of the arrows he made last night as they had waited for their quail diner to roast, whittling them from straight branches with quail-feather fletches. Let me try, he pleaded. 

Don stared a moment, at Tony, at the pack, back at Tony. He set his mouth in a grim line, suppressing any doubts he might have. He nodded, but in a warning arch of his dark eyebrows was the statement, ‘You got one chance, then we do it my way.’

Tony could only agree.

Don was surprised as hell when Tony stepped away from him, and circled around down-slope, to come up at the group from below and the other side. 

Å 

There was a ravine behind Don, the result of rain-water run-off, the lip of it on this side would be almost invisible until you were over it and tumbling. Tony’s plan was simplicity itself: to stampede the little pack into the gully so they could be captured with minimum fuss. 

One arrow thumping loudly into the turf at the roadside, just by the man’s feet, got their attention. Another, even closer, got the man shouting a hoarse guttural “Kree!” with a flash of gold electric eyes and the doubled timbre of a goa’uld. 

Tony came out of the woods and let them see him, taking aim with a third rough-made arrow, and they veered away, taking a route that would carry them into the woods just north of Don, right where he wanted them. 

The series of crashes and cries right after indicated his little plan had worked. 

As Tony reached the top of the ravine, he saw Don below, sending a vicious right hook into the adult’s chin, knocking him unconscious. Down for the count. The kids were slow to struggle, and Don started on the eldest boy, roping him securely before he could escape. Tony quickly scrambled down into the gully, to help with the older girl. The two littlest were hardly any challenge at all. 

Well, except that it seemed the parasite in the littlest boy had decided his host was a lost cause, and he’d rather try for one of these upright, healthy and fit men…

Oh no you don’t, you little fucker, Tony thought, quick to focus on that malevolent mind. He was afraid he maybe had put too much juice in it… the kid went alarmingly limp. But it was just sleep, in both human and parasite. 

Tony was a little more cautious, putting the other four goa’uld asleep, to stop them getting ideas. He needed time to work up to this. 

Panting a bit, Don slapped him on the shoulder. “Nice work. Next time give me a hint, though, will you?”

“Sure. But I kinda thought the plan was obvious, once I got going.”

“Oh sure, it was, *then*.”

Å 

There were certain herbs included in any shaman emergency pack that Tony needed, but he wasn’t sure he had enough of it with him for five. He could keep the hosts down and out until help arrived, but something inside him *burned* at the mere thought of any of these victims being imprisoned even one second longer than necessary. 

Using Blair’s instructions, he experimented a little, and found he could tell a lot about each of these goa’uld, by reaching into their somnolent minds. The low-level telepathic ability they possessed, through their race-memories from their spawning queen, that enabled them to attach to and dominate a host mind, link and control a host body, also left open a door for a shaman to enter. Able to sense auras, to feel an empathic signature and the play of strong emotions spilled from unwary minds, a shaman could follow such traces back to source, their own brand of tracker skills. 

The goa’uld in the man called itself ‘The Kurgan’, and he was a right bastard. Spawn of Hathor herself, he had first taken a human host decades ago, and resisted every mating urge since that might see him dead. In fact, any mating lures he detected, he hunted down until he could kill the queen issuing the invitation, along with any drone suitors nearby. But unlike many other goa’uld in human hosts, he was a loner who never felt the need to build himself an army of sycophant followers. His own brand of goa’uld arrogance told him he didn’t need or want anyone else to make him a lord in his own right. He had been terrorizing remote encampments all this time, on the fringes of established settlements, stealing food, killing any humans who came in his way, unless they seemed like an upgrade on his current host, always the strongest male, then he took them over. He always left the previous host dying in agony, its brain-stem torn out, gushing life-blood from the open wound, until the victim bled out. He particularly liked taking a host and then attacking that human’s family, killing them with their husband’s, son’s or father’s own hands, laughing when any tried to fight him, and could see the agony in their eyes at failing to kill one they loved. 

Oh yeah, Tony determined, this one *needed* to get dead. 

In the past year or so, however, The Kurgan had attacked one settlement that called down vengeance upon his head. He was being hunted himself, by allies of his victims, and for once was uncharacteristically unsure he could best those seeking him out. So he had gone on the run, looking for allies of his own he could be sure to dominate. 

The next oldest was the one in the oldest boy. The parasite was ten years old, and… that couldn’t be true, could it? The host looked no more than ten or twelve years old himself! 

“Yeah,” Don reminded him as he built up a little campfire for the special sedative tea they would need to brew, “hosts don’t age the same as regular humans. He was probably no more than ten when he was taken.”

Tony winced, and shuddered. 

This one had been a loner for much of its time in a host body. A little too young when it first hosted, and in the body of a child, it hadn’t been physically capable of switching hosts for years. The more time spent in this one, the less able the body was to defend itself, much less attack others. In that time, it had wandered in wilderness areas, living off raw fish it caught in rivers and streams, far from any humans for fear of being discovered and captured. It kept far from its own kind, too, avoiding them at mating season, for the same reasons. He had only recently come across The Kurgan, in the last month or so. The older goa’uld had promised protection in exchange for service, along with the chance to take a stronger, older host. The nameless goa’uld had agreed. 

The Kurgan reasoned, for the first time, if one servant was good, then more was better…

Together, the pair of them had ventured down to the shoreline south of Seacouver Sound, to one of the more isolated fjord inlets. They had followed the track of a wild werog, its path braiding with others, to find a hosting season taking place. A family of human fishers had been taken unawares, the husband and wife killed, the three children already taken as hosts. The Kurgan easily talked the kids into joining them, again promising protection and better hosts in exchange for their service. But when a bull werog attacked, the kids all ran to the fishing hut for safety, and The Kurgan’s host was badly injured. Even if the parasite healing abilities were up to the task, it would take a long time… too long for The Kurgan. 

The next day, a man, a friend of the family, had arrived to see what had happened, when they missed a planned meeting. The Kurgan had the three children play at being helpless and alone, until he could jump the man, overpower him and switch hosts. Only then did he discover that his new host was crippled, both legs missing below the knee, dependent upon prosthetics and crutches for transport. Oh, the temper! He raged, struck out at the kids, shouted and pounded with the despised crutches, breaking them into kindling. All he could do then was turn them into splints to hold the artificial wooden legs in place, enabling him to walk jerkily along with the assistance of two rough-hewn canes.

Desperate for a better host, all too aware how vulnerable he was right now, determined to move his four minions into bodies better able to serve him, he avoided the more populated communities, and aimed for something a little more remote. Say, a lonely alpaca station he knew of, high in the mountains. 

Å 

As Tony crumpled dried herbs into their camp pot to make tea, Don slowly stood, eyes gone sharp, head a little to one side, listening, and sniffing. In the deep ravine, with rain threatening and no doubt already falling not too far away, the scents carried on the damp wind were diffused, but he was listening to something. 

“Trouble?” Tony asked mildly, paying attention to his very special tea. And wouldn’t it just be his luck, he thought, for them to be jumped out here in the middle of nowhere, dead centre between Rainier and Seacouver, a day’s swift travel from the nearest help, even from their sentinel training watchers. 

“Don’t know… don’t think so… they’re tracking our friend here. Don’t know why.”

“Okay. You want me to hold off on this until we know?”

“No… they’re on foot, about two hours out. Don’t think any of them are sentinels. There are six of them, all human, so no hosts… one a woman… but there’s something… I don’t know. Something out there smells like Lanteans, but… not. I don’t know.”

“Well, The Kurgan is getting a little feisty, so I want to deal with him as soon as I can. I also want to start on him, in case I get this wrong, being my first time and all… The worst that happens, he dies in the host, and we maybe loose this guy, too. It may sound awful of me… but if I’m going to accidentally kill an innocent host, I’d rather it not be one of the kids.”

“No, no, I get it… and if the guy could talk to us, he’d volunteer for it. A lot of hosts after release don’t make it. Can’t take the guilt, the nightmares.”

Tony nodded solemnly. 

The tea was a specific kind of sedative that was found to work on goa’uld, humans and Magicals alike. It would numb all sensation in the host, and calm the invading parasite, make it… suggestible. As if in a hypnotic trance. In this state, a shaman could reach in, connect, and make it think easing gently out of a host was an escape to freedom. 

While in a host body, after all, the snake-like goa’uld parasite was unable to move in any way, and the hyper-sensitive scales required for sea living were absolutely blunted. Frozen in place, it needed the connection to the host nervous system to feel, to move and act, to dwell on the host senses and reactions for pleasure, pain, any interaction with its environment, sensations of all kinds. But if for some reason they were cut off from the host’s body, for instance, through the use of a strong sedative, then the numbness and helpless feeling turned to a kind of claustrophobia, and made them even more susceptible to the idea that they must leave. The trick was to suppress their natural aggression, their instinct to rip out violently, to leave their host damaged fatally and dying in their wake, so that it was unable to attack them in their more vulnerable free state. 

Tony needed to wait until The Kurgan began to rouse before delivering the tea. It was a delicate balancing act. Awake enough to listen, not so awake as to fight, and, becoming aware, kill the host out-right. Parasite blood, a shocking blue, was toxic inside a human or Magical host, and all mammal life forms. If they wished, they could nip at themselves to release their poisonous blood, so if ripped brain tissues and heavy bleeding didn’t do the trick, then the blue toxin would. This one was vindictive enough to choose that course, if it believed it was about to be pulled out anyway, and elect to make a last-ditch dive to any nearby creature. 

Tony picked his moment, and offered a cup of hot drink to a thirsty and still-dazed being. It drank the brew down without a qualm, and then eased back into the ravine floor of leaves. Tony put careful hands on either side of the man’s hairy unkempt and dirty face, and stared into the filmy eyes. He imagined his mind sinking deeply past those blue orbs, past the host’s own tormented, captive brain, to the teeth biting into the brain-stem, and deeper still, into the little sucker’s own paralyzed consciousness. 

Yes, paralyzed. Motionless. Helpless. Not like the creeks, streams, rivers after its hatching. Not like the free salt-water ocean, swimming unhindered, chasing food, being chased… the exhilaration of freedom in its natural form. Tony knew that desire, knew it intimately, and dwelled on it. Oh, to be free, completely free… 

But when the goa’uld began to kick, following the instinct to tear loose, Tony took control. Pushed at the sedative keeping it calm, keeping it dopey. Easy… easy… open mouth to detach teeth. Back away, gently, gently… Don’t tear, slide. That’s it… slide… remember the slide of water against scales… slide… 

Tony was hardly even aware when there was a wet slurp, and then a splash on the ground under the man’s head. 

Don’s hand darted out and snatched up the goa’uld parasite, taking it in two hands gave a vicious twist… ripping it in two, and then throwing it down with a grimace of distaste. 

He patted Tony’s shoulder, his partner seemingly still caught in his own trance, and said, “Good job, Tony. Guy’s still breathing. Good job.”

Breathing, yes, still under the influence of the tea, but bleeding sluggishly from the hole in the back of his neck. It should be bleeding more heavily, of course, a bloody great hole in the back of the guy’s neck, but a Goa’uld parasite left a bit of residual healing power behind when it left a host, especially if it was ‘voluntarily’, so maybe this guy had caught a break there. Tony had the medical kit handy, with antiseptic, a gauze pad and tape ready to go. More boiling water to thoroughly clean the wound, then the healing salve and dressing, over the only clean patch on the guy. His furs they had ripped away and tossed into a pit as soon as he had been bound, the sentinel unable to bear the stench. 

“You okay for another?” Don asked.

Tony heaved a little, and bolted for the trees. Don was there to support him as he vomited violently, as if purging his system of all the mental and empathic contamination The Kurgan left in him. Don offered a canteen of water to rinse out his mouth, and a far less drugging herbal tisane concoction to settle his stomach. 

“I think… I think I need to rest for a little bit first. The adult host should sleep for another couple hours… don’t know what he’ll be like when he wakes. He didn’t kill anyone himself while The Kurgan was in him, or do anything terrible. It’s only been a couple ten-days since he was hosted. But that thing liked to torture his hosts by replaying memories of past slaughters. I think he’s gonna need Blair to get him past that. As for the kids… the three youngest are in first-time larvae, barely out of the water… all they’ve got to pass on is a queen’s memories, hazy at best… I’m hoping they’ll recover. But with their parents dead… I don’t know. The oldest boy… I don’t think he’s ever killed anyone either. His goa’uld has always thought itself too weak to do anything but hide and run. He’ll probably have an aversion to fresh-water or raw fish… I don’t think any of them are going to put up much of a fight, not like The Kurgan. But…”

“You need to rest? Sleep maybe? I can keep watch. This guy’s friends are still on their way, should be here in an hour or so.”

“Yeah… yeah. Okay. Need to meditate first. Get that thing’s filth out of my head.”

“’Kay. Good thing we only cooked up one batch of that sedative, hunh?”

Tony smiled wanly. “Yeah, yeah…”

“You did good, Tony. Real good. Just remember that.”

Å 

Don watched his partner doze lightly. Every once in a while he would shiver and frown, maybe chased by whatever nightmares The Kurgan had tried to force on him, or maybe the guy had enough of his own to haunt him. But Don’s hand on his shoulder, rubbing softly against his neck, trying to reassure with a touch that he was safe, he was okay… seemed to do the trick. 

The kids were all four of them in the same unconscious state Tony had originally put them in, obviously too weak, the one from hunger, the others too new in their too-young hosts, to fight his influence. Don hoped like hell the damage to these young souls was merely physical, not emotional or spiritual. 

The occasional chatter from the approaching hunter group actually reassured Don. They were looking for a friend they believed had been taken host… rightly, as it happened, and two of them were afraid he’d been taken by The Kurgan himself, well known to them as a particularly nasty goa’uld they had been seeking for some time. 

They stopped abruptly when they saw the arrows Tony had left behind, and identified the change in the tracks they followed. 

Don stood to greet them as they came to the lip of the ravine. 

“Hey there,” he called out, and Tony abruptly woke. “I’m sentinel Don Eppes of LA. This is my training partner, shaman Tony DiNozzo. We’re on a wilderness survival training mission out of the Rainier Sanctuary, and… well, my shaman seems to be something of a trouble magnet.” 

“Hey! I… okay. Maybe I am. This is not my fault, however,” Tony gestured to the five still bodies strewn around their small camp.

The one woman was the first to bounce down to them, grinning widely. 

“Oh believe me, I am more than familiar with the breed!” and she glanced back at the two tallest of her companions, both of them wrapped in tartan scarves, woven in amber, black and a thin red stripe. “You found our friend, Joe Dawson! We were coming to rescue him. And yeah, trouble magnet fits him, too. I’m Amanda. You seem to have de-goa’ulded our Joe… the strong and silent types up there, pretending they aren’t deeply impressed, are cousins Connor and Duncan MacLeod of the clan MacLeod, Juan Sánchez-Villalobos Ramírez, it’s a mouth-full, I know, just call him Ramirez, that’s Methos-of-many-names, he’ll tell you to just pick one, and last but not least, our baby-newbie, Henry Morgan. Henry? You actually have medical training, so... have at it. Check Joe out while we make nice with the good sentinel and shaman.” The younger man in the dark hair, identified as Henry Morgan, was already on his way to the one victim showing signs of bleeding, pulling off his backpack and frowning in concern. Amanda patted him on the shoulder as he passed by. “And… there seem to be a lot of kids here. Hosts? That’s pretty rare, for the goa’uld to take on kids, especially this young.”

Tony grinned at the attractive and vivacious woman, beautiful, ebony eyes, short-cut white hair, brilliant smile and all. “Yeah, hosts. I took on The Kurgan first, the most dangerous, he was in your friend Joe…” The name made Ramirez and the MacLeods stiffen, and then relax in relief, as they spotted the remains of a goa’uld parasite lying in pieces next to the fire. “I think he’s going to be okay... the bleeding is about stopped. Just concerned this isn’t the most sterile place, and he was already filthy... It took a little too much out of me, so I had to rest before doing the kids. I think I’m about ready, though.”

“I think I can help you with that,” said the one named Methos, with a sly smile. “Oh, I’m not a shaman by any means, but I’m pretty handy with herbal medicine. I can certainly brew up a dose or two of the sedative for you. And we seem to be a little better supplied than you are.” 

And they were, all with full back-packs crammed with bedrolls, tents, cooking equipment, extra clothing, flint-boxes, two cross-bows and three bo-staffs in the group, as well as a couple of pistols plainly visible. Henry was taking advantage of the little pot of water already boiling away on their little campfire. He had his first aid kit out and was alternating between prepping his supplies, boiling needle and thread, and rolling Joe Dawson to his side to uncover and examine his wound. 

Don, meanwhile, was frowning more and more mightily, as he inspected their guests. 

“You guys smell… off. Lantean, but… not. Gene? And don’t think I’m gonna out you, because I’m hiding one, too.”

Another thing Don had noted was that, besides the normal weaponry Elpers were wise to carry in the wilds, these people all had swords with them. Well-worn scabbards on their belts or back harnesses, workable hilts, none of them studded with gems for show.

Wary glances were passed around, but the most senior appearing of them, the moustached Ramirez, merely huffed. “Yes, we all have the Gene, in its purest form, since we’re all of us Alteran. Ach, you look puzzled. Alteran? The Gate Builders? Builders of Atlantis herself? Ringing any bells? Well, most of us were alive long long before the Exodus. Henry here, our youngest, was born just a few hundred years before we all left Earth…”

Blinking, Tony murmured, “Oh, you have *got* to meet Daniel Jackson. How are you so old, and not dead yet? Because you don’t look a day over... well, sixty?”

Ramirez explained, “The Highlanders over there will tell you we cannot die. Truth is, we can die, we just don’t stay dead. It’s a damn pain in the butt for all of us. Yes, Amanda, even for you. The natural progression for an Alteran is to die from this mortal reality and Ascend to a higher plane. Not the Dream Time, that’s kind of a medium drop off point for shamans, but to a level where we cast off physical form and exist as pure energy.”

Methos huffed, even as he crushed leaves into yet another small pot of boiling water. “’Higher plane’ my ass. No bloody physical form… no food, no drink, no fighting, no sex… it’s a damn hell. No wonder we each one of us turned renegade. So now, whenever one of us dies, the rest of the so-called ‘enlightened’, glowy, more-ascended-than-thou Alterans, send us right back here. Just as well, too.”

Henry Morgan, their youngest, sighed, as he carefully cleaned out the parasite exit wound. “At least you get sent back to your own bodies, where you left them. With clothes. I always get dumped, naked, in the nearest deep water, so I have to swim for shore. I am just so sick of the awkward explanations that inevitably follow! And I *still* don’t remember what I did to piss the Others off so badly.”

“But you must grant, we’re not all still stuck in The Game, back on Earth,” Duncan MacLeod sighed, as he and his cousin were the last to settle in with the rest of them. “’There can be only one’, challenging other Immortals and taking their heads to end their run for good… all for a supposed ‘Prize’ none of us really want… just a way to thin out our ranks, as far as I could ever see.”

“Umm…” Tony ventured, glancing helplessly at Don.

“Yeah, I’d say they were lying, but… I *know* they’re not. You know how crazy this all sounds, right?”

Amanda gave Ramirez, then Methos, a considering look, and said, “You sure about this, boys? It’s time to put our cards on the table, at long last?”

“Past time,” Methos grumbled. “Fighting off these damn goa’uld is bad enough, but when the Wraith finally find us… that is *not* going to be fun, especially if Atlantis is still out of power. And she really, really *likes* our new friend Tony. Oh, hey… this kid here, the oldest… he’s got a super duper Gene too. You know that, right?”

“Oh yeah,” Tony nodded to himself. “You have really *got* to meet Daniel Jackson.”

Å 

Four children were de-goa’ulded, but none were physically strong enough to fight the lingering effects of the sedative, which was just as well. Methos and Tony kept them awake long enough to drink water and eat a little bit of trail rations the Immortals had with them, but then the three orphaned siblings passed out, and that was for the best. Henry Morgan needed them quiet and unconscious so he could do what he could to stitch up their necks. 

As for the older boy, he fought the drowsiness to beg for reassurance that he was alive, free, and could go home. His poor body was thin to the point of emaciation, still covered by mud and dirt, but there were scars still visible of past dangers, past traumas. What was obviously a bullet wound to the thigh was only the start of it. There were bites, claw tears, several red marks of what looked like the lash of a triffid stinger, and now a hole in the back of his neck. But, as he had been host the longest of the kids, the residual healing ability seemed more advanced in him, and his exit wound had already begun to knit together. With a bit of cleaning, Henry judged it closed enough not to require more than a couple of stitches. 

“And where’s home?” Tony asked kindly.

“Minnesota. That’s in Stargate Commune. My name is Charlie O’Neill. Two ‘l’s.” And he held up three fingers. Which was startlingly like…

Don and Tony were both flummoxed. Could this possibly be… 

Methos patted him and said, “We’ll do the best we can, Charlie O’Neill. But you sleep now.”

There was no way they could set out for the nearest community until the five victims were in some way recovered and able to stand and walk on their own, which might be days for the worst injured, Joe Dawson. Don was able to get a message to one of the Sanctuary sentinels, informing them of where they were and what had happened. The sentinel told them help was on the way, and to sit tight. 

They were just settling down for the night, trying to get the excited Charlie O’Neill to calm enough for his much-needed sleep, when a Lantean shuttle suddenly appeared over their heads. 

Tony bolted up from his bedroll, panic tightening his insides. Gibbs! He’d hunted him down again! That relentless old soldier would never give up… he eyed the full packs of their new friends… making a run for the wilderness, to get as lost as he could, in spite of being alone and inexperienced, still seemed a better option than letting the Lanteans take him again. 

“No! Tony, wait!” Don begged him, the others coming to their feet and alert as well. Don made to reach for him, as if to grab his arm to hold him fast, stopping just short of touching him. “Look!” He pointed to the front view-port of the hovering vessel, lit from within… 

Past all probability, that was Blair Sandburg inside, grinning back at them and waving.

“That one’s ours,” Don explained hastily as Tony fought to control his raging terror, still flooding him with adrenaline, still ready to run. “Well, I say ours… it belongs to the Elpers. Sheppard and McKay have been finding them all over Novelle, abandoned… salvaging them and repairing them for us. We’ve all got one, all the Provinces, except for Cascade, and they’re just waiting to find someone who can fly theirs.” 

The newly-met Immortals all shared glances. It was Ramirez who, with a smirk, commented, “Well, this is a fortuitous meeting, then, isn’t it?”

The shuttle landed softly in the cleared road above their ravine, and clambering down the lowered back-end ramp were Jim, Blair and Rodney McKay. John Shepard was seated at the pilot’s chair, going over the controls, so he was the last one out. 

“Tony? Don?” Blair called out. “It’s us! We’re your rescue. I think we can call your wilderness survival training mission a complete success…”

Tony almost collapsed with the relief, and tried not to be too angry that the Shaman Prime had scared ten years of life out of him. “So… you’ve got Lantean shuttles?”

John Sheppard ambled up and with a smirk said, “We call ‘em puddle jumpers, not shuttles. Jumpers for short. This one will be for Cascade, when they get themselves a designated pilot.”

McKay gave a huff, even as he eyed the strangers appearing out of the trees behind Tony and Don. “John has this thing about naming stuff… Wait, is that a sword? You, new guys, you all have swords? What’s that about?”

Blair chuckled and clapped the scientist on the back. “Come on everyone. Let’s get everyone packed up and loaded, so we can get you all to help. We’ll take you back to the Sanctuary in Rainier.”

Tony still gaped, as Don grinned at him. But it was young Charlie O’Neill, newly re-awakened, who shouted, “Oh boy! Going home in *style*!”

Å


	10. Chapter 10: 'They can handle this on their own.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I’m pulling in the Immortals from *‘The Highlander’* (all media) and *‘Forever’* (TV, 2014), and melding those concepts with a Stargate background. I think it actually works pretty well – maybe better than their own shows gave them. Additional Note #1: Sincere condolences for the passing of actor Sean Connery, October 31, 2020, at age 90, who portrayed Ramirez on screen. (Always thought it hilarious, that a Frenchman played the Highlander, while Sean, a Scot in real life, played an immortal Spaniard/ancient Egyptian. Accents notwithstanding.) Additional Note #2: Actor Judd Hirsch played Abraham "Abe" Morgan, Henry’s adopted son on *‘Forever’*, and also Alan Eppes on *‘Numb3rs’*… and in some sneaky casting, David Krumholtz, who played Alan’s son Charlie Eppes, also played Abe Morgan as a young man in flash-backs on *‘Forever’*. I may play with those links later…

Å 

Once back at the Sanctuary, all five rescued hosts were taken to the medical wing. Transport had been a mere matter of minutes in the shuttle (no, sorry, as Sheppard insisted it was a jumper), so none of the five had woken yet. They were thoroughly washed before anything else, then wounds assessed, cleaned and treated, particularly the holes in the backs of their necks. 

Duncan MacLeod, Amanda and Methos kept close to Joe Dawson’s side, not wishing him to wake up alone, or with only strange faces around him. The three were particularly close to the past-militia fisherman. Connor MacLeod, Ramirez and Henry Morgan had already been hunting The Kurgan to stop his rampages, when they came across their three friends, looking for the missing Joe, and discovered the aftermath of the goa’uld hosting scene at the isolated fjord inlet. The six had joined forces to pursue a common goal. They had been resigned to the fact they might have to kill their old friend, so to find him alive and rescued from the parasite was a blessing. 

While their friends waited at Joe’s side for him to recover, Connor, Ramirez and Morgan joined the Alpha Pairs on the west porch of the Sanctuary to hear Don and Tony debrief.

Tony was able to give an outline history on each goa’uld parasite and host, background Blair and his healers would need to help each victim recover, mentally and emotionally.

“Wait a minute… Charlie O’Neill?” Jim Ellison demanded as Tony got around to names. Once loaded on the shuttle, the boy had been unable to stay awake any longer, and had collapsed into an almost coma-like sleep. Blair claimed that was natural, the kid needed it after his lengthy ordeal and weak physical state. 

“That’s what he said,” Don confirmed. 

“Oh, the Higher Powers!” Blair gasped. “That’s Jack’s son!”

The others all exchanged glances. John Sheppard spoke the thought all of them had. “I thought Jack’s kid was dead.”

Blair sighed. “Ten years ago, maybe eleven years now. At the time, Jack and his family were living in Minnesota village, north-east of Cheyenne. There was a sudden hosting season… Hathor brought a whole school with her, looking for a host with a Gene so she could take Atlantis… that’s been her plan for some time. Charlie was just ten years old at that point, playing by the shore, as he’d been warned not to do… he was taken host, along with some other kids and some unwary fishermen, and a few werogs. Then the hosts packed together to attack the village… Charlie went straight for his home, up on a high cliff above Minnesota Bay, followed by a bunch of werogs. He cornered Jack, Sara and their little girl Grace… Jack manifested as a sentinel, was forced to shoot him, but tried for a wounding shot in the hopes Charlie could be freed… but the kid was standing too near the cliff edge, fell over… his body was never recovered. He was presumed dead. Sara couldn’t handle it, blamed Jack, took Grace and left him. Jack managed to survive his own guilt, but… he’s never really gotten over it.”

“Poor Jack!” Willow exclaimed. “But if this is really his Charlie…”

Tony nodded. “I think it must be. What you just described fits what the parasite knew, along with the scar of a bullet in his thigh… must have taken a while for the parasite to recover, and by that time, it was too weak and scared to do anything but run and hide, from everyone and everything. Humans or Magicals would capture it easily, and its own kind would tear it to shreds if it went anywhere near a goa’ulded werog pack, or a spawning. It’s been running feral, well away from any people, surviving on raw fish and berries, until The Kurgan promised to get him a new, better host… and luckily, they never got the chance.”

Rodney nodded at Blair’s pointed look. “I’ll call Jack. If I know him, he’ll be here within the hour.”

Å 

And, yeah, it seemed the SGC had a jumper of their own. Jack had named it SG-1. So it took something less than an hour for Jack to arrive, with Daniel, Sam, Teal’c and healer Janet Fraser at his side. Until he was sure the miracle was real, he had held off on informing Sara, Charlie’s mother. But as soon as Blair opened the door on one of the private infirmary rooms… yeah, every shaman in Rainier got a blast of joy from the Alpha Sentinel. Janet pushed in to do a quick check on the boy, then Blair led all but Jack away, to give father and son a chance to reunite in private. 

Well, as private as such an emotional explosion could be in a town full of sentinels and shamans. 

Meanwhile, Daniel hesitated on the west porch, blinking at the three Immortals lounging there. “Umm… do I… know you?”

Ramirez laughed. “You do indeed, Daniel, son of Claire and Melburn! Tony here said we needed to speak with you… I see now how right he is!”

Connor MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod could only shake his head. “We have a lot of explaining to do, yes, but I think we need to wait until everyone is in some way recovered and can join us. Methos and cousin Duncan in particular would hate to miss it.”

Ramirez bowed with a flourish, as if he had taken a wide-brimmed hat from his head to sweep to his side. Tony swore he could almost see feathers waving from the band. “I yield to your advice, Highlander. And you’re right. Methos would not be amused to be cut out at this point. Unless I miss my guess, neither would your Alpha Sentinel, Jack O’Neill.”

Å 

Once sufficiently awake, Joe Dawson had asked to see the shaman and sentinel who had saved him, to thank them. With Duncan, Amanda and Methos sitting benignly by, Tony and Don came and took seats close to the bed. 

They had already been informed of some of Joe’s background. He had been a member of the Seacouver Militia for many years, knew Jim and Blair well. But during the defense from a hosting season, he had lost both his legs, below the knee, and had retired from active service. He had turned to a few other trades… ran a bar in the Seacouver Sound port, played in a band that entertained there, and also made frequent visits up and down the coast in a small ‘cape islander’ launch, delivering mail and supplies to remote outposts inaccessible from any route but by sea. He collected payment in the form of salted or fresh catches, to sell back in the Seacouver markets. He had got into this line as a favor to his many friends up and down the western shores. 

After thanking his rescuers sincerely, Joe began to tell them his tale. 

“I try and visit that cove weekly. The father was son of one of my old militia mates. They settled in that fjord inlet south of Seacouver Sound, a couple years ago. Man, wife, two daughters and one son. They made a pretty successful living off fishing. Off-shore weirs, seems like they’re always full, schools of herring, mackerel, other cash-market fish, and they carved out a tidal pool to hold live lobsters they’ve caught in traps all along the coast. Various large fish processors came weekly to buy their catches for salting, pickling, smoking... There’s a huge market for live lobster, in season, particularly from the Lanteans. I take away smaller amounts of fresh fish for the local markets. 

“To anyone’s knowledge, that particular cove has never experienced a hosting before. There’s a colony of dragons nesting in the crags nearby. That must have kept them out. But once humans moved in, the dragons avoided that inlet, so that was probably why the goa’uld ventured in, for the first time. 

“By the time the parents realized there was a problem, it was too late. The werogs gathering on the inlet beaches drove them to take refuge on a skiff they used for harvesting their catches, but that put them in the water, easy prey for the hosting goa’uld. All five members of the family were taken as hosts. But when they poled their skiff to shore, the werogs attacked, and took down both adults, slower to run than the children, who instinctively made for their fortified house. Then The Kurgan arrived, with his one lone minion… 

“I got there a few days later. I had no idea. I was worried when the kids came out and shouted for help… not nearly as careful as I should have been… should have seen the evidence myself, of a hosting… but I didn’t, and…”

Duncan rubbed his shoulder. “There was nothing you could have done, except arrive a few days earlier, Joe, and then you might have died with them. What happened isn’t on you.”

Joe shook his head. “No, but… it’s a damn tragedy. Those poor people… and the kids! What’s gonna happen to the kids, Duncan? My old militia mate is dead, no other family, as far as I know… I don’t suppose… maybe I could take them on? They know me. And we all have a common trauma to get over, now. Luckily, none of us were hosted for long, and none of us had to kill anyone… That bastard, The Kurgan… it’s bad enough, the nightmares he showed me. If I didn’t already hate the goa’uld with a passion, this would sure as hell tip me over.”

Å 

Of course, it wasn’t until later that night, with hurricane lamps glowing from the porch lintels, that Jack O’Neill was in any way ready to join them, and even then, he had his little Charlie curled on his lap, held tight in his arms. 

Jack confessed that he had been worried, that when Charlie woke up, he would be as accusing as Sara had always been, that he had shot Charlie when the family was attacked. But no. Weeping and nothing but glad to have his father hold him, he frantically apologized in broken sobs, for disobeying orders by playing on the shore, for getting himself hosted, for attacking his little sister… 

“I was gonna kill Grace, Dad! I tried, I swear I did, but the thing inside me… it was gonna kill Grace! You saved me from that. You saved me. I know you shot to wound… then I fell… and then I had to hide, run away, while the thing inside me was still groggy, or else I might have killed all of you. You saved me, Dad. Please, forgive me?”

“Always, Charlie! Of course I forgive you… but there’s nothing for me to forgive. I love you, kiddo. I love you so much, and I can only thank the Higher Powers that you’re back. Don’t you worry about anything else. Your Mom and Grace are going to be so thrilled to have you back…”

Å 

The Immortals were given the floor first of all. They told pretty much the same tale they had revealed to Don and Tony in that gully. By that time, most of the ‘mortals’ had got over the first shock of the revelation that such people could actually exist at all. And no matter how tuned sentinel senses were, or how intrusive shaman empathy, they could detect no lie in that part of the tale. Slight evasions, maybe… but not outright lies. And, really, everyone was entitled to their secrets. Just the thought of how many you could accumulate over thousands of years… As long as they didn’t endanger the Tribe, and so far, that didn’t seem to be the case here.

“We’ve always been there, hidden among mortals,” Ramirez explained. “We start out as babies, abandoned on doorsteps, of homes, hospitals, churches… grow as normal humans to adulthood, no memories of a past life, who we really are… until we have our first ‘death’. Then we are returned to life, completely healed, with a few extra… bells and whistles, I guess you could say. The Quickening is the big one. It’s the power within that heals us of pretty much anything… except decapitation, of course. Take our heads, and it’s all over. But short of that…”

“Oh, and…” Henry Morgan interjected, “We’re sterile or barren, all of us. Only makes sense… to be Immortal *and* fertile? That’s a recipe for overpopulation no planet can withstand.” 

Ramirez huffed a little at the interruption, then continued. 

“The Alterans, the bastards, our own damn people… for whatever bent reasons, decided we few needed to be punished. So they send us back to life on the mortal plane, as mind-wiped helpless babies… with only fractured memories of our past existence as Alterans, and only once we’ve died the first time. Just enough memory to tell we were renegades, defying their rules. Then they set up something we call the Game. ‘There can be only one’. They told us there would come a time when we would all gather, all of us Immortals, and fight it out until only one of us was left, and that one would get a Prize. They never told us what this fabulous Prize was. Until that day, some of us decided to get a little early thinning out going, but there are strict rules. We can sense when another of us is near, a kind of buzz in the back of our heads. One of us will Challenge another, one on one, we duel with swords, to the death…”

McKay muttered, “Well, that explains the swords, I suppose, damn archaic remnants of the Dark Ages…”

“Hey!” Willow Rosenberg protested with a grin, patting the wickedly sharp sword she kept strapped to her belt. “Buffy may swear by Mr. Pointy, but there’s nothing better than a sword if you’re fighting in mine tunnels, where a bullet can ignite trapped gases, or a stray energy shot set off naquadah-enhanced explosions. It’s so *satisfying* to cut a goa’uld or other enemy in two!”

Connor MacLeod of the clan MacLeod stood straight with his arms crossed on his chest, looking every inch the warrior. “The little one is right. Swords are certainly best in close-quarters battle. And the Dark Ages, as you call them, weren’t all that dark. It’s where I learned to fight, and fight well.”

Ronon grunted, and chimed in, “It would have been nice to have one in Sateda, when the ammo ran out and the stun guns gave out. All I had left to fight with was a scythe. So as soon as Teyla freed me, I made sure to get myself this baby.” And he caressed his own long, fine-edged blade, not quite a sword, but far more than any dagger.

“And taking the head of an enemy?” Methos observed with relish and a grin full of teeth, “Nothing like it. I agree whole-heartedly with our little friend here.”

Willow blushed happily at the praise of the two extremely attractive ‘older’ men… while Buffy gave her an indulgent look. 

Rodney, meanwhile, checked the muscles in the elder MacLeod’s arms… and settled deeper in his chair, red-faced and snapping his mouth shut, lips working to keep it that way, and himself out of antagonizing a formidable unknown. Methos, noting the backtracking, actually had the nerve to laugh in his face! 

Ignoring the side conversation, Ramirez continued, “When we take the head of another, we take on their Quickening. Makes us stronger. Gives us their power, their memories, of all the ages they have lived, of all the lives they have taken. So the more heads we take, the stronger we are. It’s a wee bit on the addictive side, this Quickening. And not all Immortals are good guys…”

“Hell no,” Methos agreed cheerfully, almost bragging as he kept careful watch on Rodney’s reactions, in particular. “I was a right bastard, for a lot of centuries. A *lot*. One of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. They called me Death.”

Amanda chuckled. “And I spent most of my time on Earth as a thief.”

“Earth?” Daniel perked up, ears twitching.

“That’s the name of the human Home World,” Henry Morgan explained. “I know you’ve all forgotten… we never knew the name of the Magicals’ Home World, and they don’t remember, either. They don’t seem to have any Immortals among them. Maybe theirs decided to stick it out on their own world when the Wraith came…”

“The Wraith!” Daniel yelped. “You know of the Wraith? They’re real? They’re actually real?”

“Real as a heart-attack,” Duncan verified. “That ‘extinction-level event’ that sent us running, as far and as fast as we could? The Wraith found Earth. I don’t know what happened to the rest of the humans and Immortals we left behind. The humans will all be dead, for sure, drained down to husks, unless they kept a few for breeding, to farm like cattle. For all I know they could *still* be eating any of us they found… but the six of us were lucky enough to hitch a ride on Atlantis. Well, one of the Environmental Life Pods, anyway.” 

Connor frowned mightily. “And that is what we need you to know. The Wraith will be coming. Maybe not soon, but they’re coming. They feed like locusts, hibernate for centuries while they wait for their human and Magical herds to recover, then begin culling all over again. They’re always looking for fresh herds to cull. They have space ships. They know, and fear, Atlantis. They know, and hate, all Alterans, or even those with the Alteran legacy, the ATA Gene. And our only defense, our only protection, is Atlantis herself.”

“Which is a problem,” Jack O’Neill declared. “Because you must know as well as we do, she’s fast running out of even the power it takes to light up her halls and open her doors. The damn Lanteans have run her into the ground. And as far as they’re concerned, we Elpers are no more than a damn inconvenient nuisance they wish didn’t exist at all.”

“Yes,” Ramirez nodded. “We know all this. Which is why we’ve decided to finally come out of hiding, after thousands of years of secrecy.”

“Well, then,” Jack declared with a shit-eating grin, “Lucky for all of us that we just happen to have a plan or two up our sleeves. And one of the things we were waiting for, was someone from Cascade with the Gene, to fly the jumpers. Welcome to the Revolution, guys.”

Å 

“Yes, about that,” said Tony, glancing at Don, then the other Guardians. “You’ve got shuttles?”

John grinned. “We prefer to call them puddle jumpers.”

McKay scowled at his sentinel mate. “The City Builders… Alterans… called them seneschals. Sometimes they’re referred to as ‘gate-ships’, although no one seems to know why. But yes, we salvaged about a dozen of them. I’ve repaired seven and I’m working on an eighth…”

“Hey!” Sam Carter interrupted, looking highly offended. Rodney held up his hands with a scowl, but it was a gesture of surrender.

“Okay, okay, Sam is helping me with the repairs. Looks like Jumper Eight is going to be all on her, for the time being. Anyway… They’re our most closely held secret from the Lanteans, because if they knew we had them, they’d demand to have them back. Over the two hundred plus years since the Landing, quite a few either crashed, were lost, wore out, or simply ran out of charge, and were left where they landed. John and I have been tracking them down. I’ve been… sorry, me *and Sam*… getting a glowering look from the serious Alpha Sentinel Aaron Hotchner, McKay amended again, “Okay, *and Reid*, have been fixing the ones that need repairs. We’ve cobbled together re-charge units for them, too, from the naquadah generators we have. All the Guardian teams now have one each, plus the one Don can fly for LA…”

Harry Potter waved a hand and said, “Except us. We don’t have one. Don’t need it. We have our own ways of getting around.”

Tony felt a little tingle of excitement at that. “Apparition, right?” He had only the vaguest idea of what a Magical’s power really was, like any mundane, or Muggle, as they tended to call a human without any Magical blood at all. But even Tony had heard of the Apparition spell, spot-to-spot translocation over great distances.

Luna smiled benignly. “Yes, Apparition. It’s a Magical thing. But we also have portkeys, a flue network, brooms, hippogriffs, thestrals, some dragons can be trained to carry riders…”

McKay chose to ignore the interruption. “John and I have Jumper One. Jack has Jumper Two. Jumper Three went to Xander Harris for Hellmouth. Jumper Four is Spencer’s for Pastureland, and Don here flies Jumper Five for LA. Six is parked under cloak just outside Rainier, but without someone in the Province with a strong enough ATA Gene, it’s a big grounded rock. But…” he glanced at the collected Immortals. “I assume, as Alterans, you’ve all got a super-Gene?”

Ramirez grinned like a cat that got the canary. “I believe your term would be ATA-A level. And yes, we all six of us have it. And we all six can fly the seneschals, have no worries. But I think we should designate Henry here as the official Cascade pilot.” He gave a thump on Henry Morgan’s back, and the young man merely glared at him, seriously annoyed. 

“This is because I’m youngest of you all, right? Last in line, again?”

Amanda smiled wide as could be. “That would be correct, dear Henry. And you’re adorable when you’re peeved, you know that, right?”

Å 

“Okay, okay, enough hazing the new guy,” Jack broke up the chuckles. “Morgan, you’re willing to be the official Cascade jumper pilot? Terrific. Welcome aboard. Then let’s get down to it,” Jack demanded, and once again, the higher-ranked Jim Ellison yielded to the more forceful and extrovert Alpha Sentinel. “Our current problem is the Lanteans, and what’s going to happen when the City runs out of gas. 

“Now, in a way, this might look like a good thing for us, since, hey presto, a City without power means the Lanteans lose that political strangle-hold they’ve always had over us all. Our first option, Option A we call it, is to stand back and let the fuckers run out of power, city-wise and political. But… without even what little support they do give us, our survival prospects against the goa’uld look just a little worse. And now, with this new Wraith threat hanging over all our heads? Yeah, if the City sinks, so do we. So, much as I would *delight* to see the damn Lanteans get their comeuppance… and believe me, I *would* so like to see that… well, maybe we just can’t afford to let it get that far. 

“But I have to tell ya, I’m getting *real* tired of these damn Lantean overlords pissing all over our yard. That hosting attack on Cheyenne last ten-day-and-a-half was just the latest offense, and nowhere near the worst. I made a formal protest to the Captain over that clusterfuck. I know Jim here did as well, over what Gibbs did in Cheyenne. And we got about as far as we expected.” Jack scowled angrily at that, but Daniel patted him soothingly. 

The Stargate Alpha Shaman continued, “The thing is, we can’t afford to just… cut all ties with the City. She’s *still* our best hope of continued survival.”

Rodney glowered darkly. “But the time is coming, sooner than any of us expect, when they won’t be able to keep control of her. Their number of high-level Gene-carriers is dropping like a stone, she’s just about out of power, running on fumes right now. A City without a drop of power isn’t going to be much use to anyone. Without even a minimal Shield in place, those low-riding piers alone are an invitation to goa’uld invasion. I don’t think Atlantis will obey any orders given by a host, Gene or not, if they’re identified as compromised by an alien invader. But without any power at all? Not much anyone can do with her anyway. Chances are she might even tip over and sink.”

Methos thoughtfully shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. She’ll have kept enough reserve capacity to use her failsafe.”

Blinking, McKay echoed, “Failsafe?”

Methos smiled, a little on the feral side, light blue eyes twinkling. “She has an emergency over-ride command to sink herself to the ocean floor in dire need. Including running out of power. There she can nestle into the mud at the bottom and wait it out, without doing any structural damage to herself. She’ll seal bulkheads to the top ten floors of the *Centresium* – sorry, the Central Command Tower, so it’s accessible by seneschal, to allow someone to insert and activate a new *potentia* - what the Lanteans call a Zero Point Module, Rodney – and get her back to the surface.”

“Aw hell…” McKay muttered.

“She’s maybe a few months from that tipping point right now. So whatever plan you come up with, you’re going to need to supply a power source first. Something with more oomph than a few naquadah generators can provide. You got one?” 

Spencer glanced warily between Methos, Rodney and Daniel. “Our Option B?” he asked. “The submerged power plant you detected, Rodney? We can reach it by… seneschal, correct? Maybe get it running again? That could supply the City with power, indefinitely?”

Methos and Ramirez shared a look. Ramirez said, “You’re talking about a submerged platform set up for thermal power conversion, correct? Yes. That’s another fail-safe written into the Atlantis AI. As soon as the City landed on Novelle, it will have launched its thermal power plant to find an underwater volcanic vent. The plant platform stays suspended over the vent, to convert heat into energy. When running properly, it provides the equivalent of one ZPM of power, transmitted to a linking unit that is designed to plug into the City undercarriage, directly into power storage cells. I don’t know why that didn’t work… Damage to the plant, broken lines, some vital part wearing out… Well damn. You need to get that thing operational and connected. With enough energy to equal one fully charged *potentia*, you can get the shield and cloak running. Maybe even power up the Starg-”

At this point, Methos coughed, loudly and pointedly, and all six Immortals looked uncomfortable. Looks exchanged, eyebrows and mouths wiggling in silent conversation… not missed by *anyone* on the west porch. But then again… everyone was entitled to their secrets… and it was no mystery that Atlantis still had a few of her own, never revealed to humans, for whatever reason. They could only hope those reasons were good ones. 

Ramirez himself choked a little. “Yes, well. The thermal power plant is enough to get the whole City lit up and operational again. It won’t allow for the star-drive, of course, not when the City has to stay plugged in, and the range isn’t that great. But you’d have protection, and, if you’re careful, limited use of the FS facilities. Thing is, after two hundred-odd years on the ocean floor, and it would seem the plant hasn’t actually been functioning since some time soon after Landing, no doubt it will take a bit of repair and refurbishment to get it up and running. I think maybe that’s a job that we can take on, if you’ll let us have Jumper Seven. We Immortals remember enough from our time as Alterans to fix that kind of tech.”

Everyone was silent for a moment, considering that. Because making it possible for the Captain and his utterly corrupt Officer Elite to continue with their status quo… wasn’t going to help anyone’s long-term survival odds, any more than out-right losing the City entirely. It also depended on the Guardian Alphas trusting these newly-arrived strangers. Especially after the hastily-covered secret Ramirez had been about to blurt out. 

The others exchanged puzzled glances, wondering what the hell kind of secret their new friends the Immortals were holding close to their chests. Well, probably more than one. Daniel, it seemed from his thoughtful look, had a guess what that might be about, and Tony, glancing at the historian, had his own suspicion, but this was not the time to go into it. With their obvious superior knowledge of the City, the Immortals might be thinking of the same possibility Tony was.

Tony was aware of it… and had yet to speak it aloud, to anyone. That the Atlantis database held the blueprints for making more of the Zero Point Modules, the power cells that fueled the City. She needed three fully charged and plugged in for full power, and at present she had only one still glowing with any charge at all. 

The difficulty was… charging the ZPMs was extremely dangerous. Dealing with that level of energy always was. So the original City Builders had required that, although constructing inert ZPM canisters could be accomplished through the FS, charging them (or re-charging the depleted ones) had to occur… elsewhere. On another planet. An uninhabited planet with the necessary charging facilities. The City database held an address of sorts for such a facility… but Tony had never asked how they were supposed to reach that other planet. The City star-drive was off-line, without two, and better all three, fully charged ZPMs to run it, plus an active Shield and Life Support. At a minimum. The shuttles were space-capable, yes, but to reach another planet, presumably in another star system? Even if it were possible to supply enough air, water and food for such a journey, how long would it take, round trip? When asked, Atlantis had told him, by shuttle, to the nearest one she had in her logs, a minimum of fifty years. So his own personal Option C, of replacing the spent ZPMs with full ones? Not really possible anyway. No sense in mentioning it.

But there was something he felt he *should* mention. 

“She’s not happy.”

“Not happy?” Blair asked in surprise. 

“She’s not happy with the leadership. She can... I guess, feel their corruption. She doesn’t like it. It’s why she’s closed off access to certain parts of her database. That includes any alternate energy sources she has access to, or can make available, like your power plant. She doesn’t trust any of the current Lanteans with the knowledge. She doesn’t want them to misuse it, or continue to misuse her. As far as she’s concerned, *everyone* she brought to Novelle belongs to her, she feels responsible for *all* of us. The Lantean failures in that regard are... distressing to her.”

There were looks all around the porch. 

It was Aaron Hotchner who ventured to say what they were all wondering. “So, Tony, do you think the City would support... a coup?”

He blinked. “Um... a coup?”

Harry Potter nodded. “We’re tentatively calling it Plan A, and we’ve been considering it for a very long time. If we Elpers banded together and sent a sufficient force to take over the City, claim her, depose the Captain and his Officer Elite... would she support us, or would she act to defend the Crew?”

“I... I don’t know... seriously, guys? You’re planning a coup?”

“We were actually going to wait until the City ran out of power altogether,” Buffy Summers admitted with a shrug. “That’s obviously not a good idea if she’s going to sink herself, so we’d need the power plant first. But then… It’s not like we can’t over-whelm them with numbers. There’s only about five thousand Lanteans in all, right? One thousand militia alone?”

“But it’s not just the numbers!” Tony protested, appalled at the very idea. Yes, there was a morass of corruption among the Lanteans, a culture of greed, entitlement, arrogance... but not everyone was bad. There were all the Gene Orphans, laboring under oppression and discrimination. There were the first generation children of Gene Orphans, also resentful of the way they were treated. And even among the Lantean-born, there were many just trying to live their lives. Some of his wives hadn’t been *that* bad... and, by the Higher Powers, there were his kids... His Kids! Kids, the powerless, the innocents... an armed insurrection of any kind could put everyone at hazard. But, even so... Well, maybe he wasn’t so much appalled... as thought he *ought* to be appalled, and actually thought it might be the best thing for everyone. If they could survive it. And that was the problem, and the thing that really had him shuddering. 

“They’ve got weapons. They don’t need the City to defend them. They’ve got advanced weapons. Rifles, pistols, rail guns, drones. They have zats that stun with one shot, kill with two, disintegrate with three. Stun rifles that can be amped up and set to kill and kill really hard. None of those bastards will go down without a fight. And then what do you do with them? They’ve been trained to run the City, however bad they are at it. Who are you going to get to take over from them? They’ll never bow to Elper commands. Okay, so you might get the Gene Orphans to side with you... most of them, anyway. They’re not much happier with the situation on the City than Atlantis is, or you are. But the born-Lanteans? Any of them, down to the lowliest janitor? You’d have to strand them on the mainland somewhere, an island, maybe... yeah, an island, too far to swim, too dangerous with goa’uld larvae around... and you’d have to have a shaman scan them even if they agree to submit, because, you know, you can’t trust them an inch.”

Rodney McKay smirked. “Stranding them on an island sounds good to me. I know just the one, too. Nice sandy beach with plenty of coconut trees. And as for who takes over the actual running of the City... I was the Chief Science Officer for years. You know how much actual operating was going on while I was in charge? Almost none. Any repairs were done by me, Radek Zelenka and a very few others, including Reid here, and we could barely keep up with the priority list on any given day. There was no one with a strong enough Gene to light up the Command Chair. Apart from Chuck in ops, who’s first gen, there’s no one among the Officer cadre who can work any console in the place. They’ve got, maybe, twenty people in the SF ranks who can fly a shuttle and have been taught how to do it, another half dozen maybe in the other divisions. That’s it. There’s more Gene power on this porch right now than on the whole of Atlantis.”

“We do have a plan for a coup that takes into account assistance from the City herself,” Spencer ventured to Tony, almost in apology. “And, of course, a sufficient level of power. Rodney and I have been working on it since we surfaced. 

“There are bulkheads and force field walls all over Atlantis that can be locked down in case of emergency... invasion, contagion, toxic leaks... In fact, we programmed an emergency protocol ourselves in the event of a goa’uld hosting on the City, and it would serve us well for a bloodless take-over. We would need surprise on our side, of course, but we could, perhaps, get the City to initiate the Hosting A lock-down measures. That will shut down the transport cabinets, close all bulkheads and force-fields, lock the stairwells… there’s a variation we programmed called Hosting B, that would also lock out the armories and the shuttle bay… That would seal everyone in pockets so we could disarm them and deal with them in small, easily controlled batches. Our vastly larger numbers would then be most effective. That would definitely be our preference, since it would mean far less risk of violence, and far fewer casualties, on either side.”

Everyone looked at the Immortals, who, flummoxed, all looked to Methos. He held up his hands. “Don’t look at us. Henry’s your pilot. And we fight with swords. Exclusively. Well, mostly. And we’re going to be fixing up your thermal power plant for you, so we’ll be busy with that. You think you can take the City? I say go for it.”

Jack sat back, nodding. “So, what do you think, Tony? Will Atlantis play ball with us?”

Tony blinked. He studied the two men he somehow *knew* were the strongest Gene-carriers alive... apart from himself. His green eyes narrowed, and he challenged them right back. “I don’t know, Jack, John. Why don’t the two of you ask her yourselves?”

Å 

Later that night, the six Immortals gathered on their own on the porch. Here in sentinel central, privacy was absolutely nonexistent. They were all too aware that their secrets, evasions and mis-directions had not been lost on their new friends. With raised suspicions, no time to let trust develop, and Alphas all too ready to defend against any perceived threat, it would be totally unreasonable of the guests to expect not to be kept under constant observation. But then, they had familiarity with languages long lost and left behind on old Earth. Even Henry, their youngest, could make do with French and American Sign Language. 

Amanda waved her elegant long-fingered white hands in swift graceful arcs and shapes, conveying to the watching Methos, ‘I suppose you have your reasons for keeping the Stargate a secret? They’re going to need it if they want to reach a *potentia* recharging station. And that’s going to be vital, when the Wraith finally do show up.”

Methos smirked, his own neat hands dancing before him. ‘If for only that reason, we need to keep it secret. We know the *Chappa’ai* in the Atlantis *Centresium* is shut down and sealed, probably won’t even turn on if they don’t get more power to the City first. And none of us has been able to find the one that must be hidden somewhere on Novelle. So they have no access anyway. What point in telling them about it? Plus… we all know there are Lantean Intel operatives and informants wandering around in every corner of every settlement. *Probably* none of them are sentinels, or I would hope not… In any case… There is no way I want the Lanteans getting access to the *Chappa’ai*, or the means to gain themselves a fully charged *potentia*.’

‘Granted,’ Ramirez confirmed his agreement.

Duncan frowned. ‘And when the Wraith show up?’

Methos shrugged. ‘Then we re-think the time line. But for now, let’s see how our Elper friends do with this coup of theirs. If they should succeed… that should be plenty of time to get our Lady up and running, extend her long-range scanners, give us some warning in time to prepare for the Wraith to show up. Or worse, the Ori.’

‘We’re not going to join them in their coup?’ Connor challenged. The big man had trained from his first childhood to be a warrior, back in medieval Scotland. It didn’t sit right with him to take to the sidelines in a fight. Especially one where the stakes were so high. He was sure his younger cousin felt the same.

Methos smirked, sharing a glance with Ramirez. ‘Always so bloodthirsty, you Highlanders. Let’s just concentrate on the power plant, and wait and see what the Guardians come up with. They seem well competent enough to me. They can handle this on their own.’

Å


	11. Chapter 11: "That's how you run a coup."

Å 

The official complaint from the Alpha Sentinel Prime of Novelle, and the Alpha Sentinel of Stargate Commune, for the insubordinate and illegal actions of Squadron Commander Gibbs in the matter of the Goa’uld hosting season on Cheyenne, hit the desk of the Captain the very next day. And, in spite of Gibbs’ belief that it would all wash, it caused quite the furor among the Lantean Officer Elite. Much as they claimed to deny it, they knew their political position was becoming increasingly problematic, as the time remaining to the last Atlantis ZPM ticked down. There were a number of negotiations going on for trade that the Elpers were dragging their feet on… as if they knew their bargaining position could only improve in, oh, a few more months. 

And even if that wasn’t taken into account, the Captain had been… embarrassed. By damn *Elpers*! Gibbs hadn’t even told him what happened in Cheyenne, except for the obvious lack of the DiNozzo kid coming back with him, and the talk of him having caught Hathor. He’d been completely blind-sided by the accusation and demand for punishment, which made him look *bad*. In front of damn *Elpers*!

The Atlantis Chief Judge Advocate General, JAG Albert Jethro Chegwidden, had been stuck in this same damn meeting for what felt like days. As the designated legal counsel for the Officer Elite, he pretty much had to be there in this kind of discussion. But no matter how much they yelled and argued and ranted at him, there was no changing the Clauses of the Novelle Charter. Not unless they were prepared to invoke the Twenty-Ninth Clause, and suspend the whole damn thing entirely. AJ was pretty damn sure no one in this room was stupid enough to pump for that, no matter how angry or frustrated. 

The Charter was pretty damn clear on this subject, like the Fifth Gene Mandate and Nineteenth Sentinel/Shaman clauses. And Clause Twenty-One *clearly* stated that in matters regarding colony conflicts, which specifically included goa’uld attacks on the mainland or islands, the Alpha Sentinels had full authority to command. 

Yeah, that loose cannon Gibbs had been *way* out of line. Any of that bastard’s subordinates ever defy *him* that way, and he’d have strung them up from the highest tower on the City by their entrails. Since both Alpha Prime Ellison and Alpha O’Neill had lodged official complaints, AJ had no choice but to issue his verdict of ‘damn right Gibbs was massively insubordinate, ignoring proper chain-of-command and guilty of mutiny’.

The only arguments against his ruling were nonsense, legally speaking. ‘Just a damn Elper’ didn’t cut it. ‘It was Hathor herself’ was likewise a dead issue. The final DNA tests coming back from the Medical labs told them the dead parasite Gibbs brought back was not, in fact, Hathor, but one of her younger daughters, and therefore sharing many of the same memories and attributes as her far more dangerous mother. And as for the ‘can’t afford to lose face with the damn Elpers’… and therefore refusal to admit any Lantean could be in the wrong… Well, shit. 

Of course, even with a verdict in favor of the complainants, the sentence to be levied was at the Captain’s discretion. 

And that was a foregone conclusion. An official reprimand in his jacket, a few ten-days in some disgusting and humiliating make-work community service project… probably cleaning out the sewage hoppers… and that would be it. It would only be that much for the level of embarrassment the SF Commander had caused. No demotion, no serious consequences, nothing to discourage Gibbs, or anyone else, from repeating the offense at some other time.

Yeah, AJ pretty much hated this end of his job. 

He had accepted his nomination for the role of JAG in the first place because it was a way to at least *try* to keep the Officer Elite honest and accountable… fat lot of good that did. He was certainly a hell of a lot better at it than Phil Davenport had ever been… that slimy son of a gun was for sale to the highest bidder. Pure Lantean, that one, with next to no ATA, barely rated as an ATA-D. 

Call him a starry-eyed naïve optimist, but AJ had thought that he might be able to do some good as JAG, unlike any of the previous candidates for this thankless job. He had retired as SF Squadron Commander last year, and had planned to request permission to relocate back to his original home in DeeCee. But Leon had approached him with an alternate offer… He had been the first Gene Orphan to even be suggested as a nominee to one of the two elected Officer positions in over a century. Lantean local bylaws made JAG the *only* Officer post open to Gene Orphans, or could be voted on by Gene Orphans. Only born-Lanteans were eligible to serve in the higher ranks, or vote on the Captain. So once Leon Vance had nominated him, it was pretty much a no-brainer that AJ would win the election. It hadn’t really registered for the Officer Elite before that, just how *many* Gene Orphans, and first generation, they had on the City. Why Leon had stuck his neck out like that was a mystery AJ had been unable to solve in his first term in the post. He had been re-affirmed in the most recent elections, just a month back. 

“So you’re telling me there’s no wiggle room at all here? We just have to admit Gibbs was in the wrong and decide on a fitting punishment?” The Captain demanded, giving Gibbs a fishy stare.

“That’s what I’m telling you, sir,” AJ confirmed. That’s what he’d been telling them for days, whether they had listened or, mostly, not.

Scowling at his unrepentant Commander, the Captain growled out, “I’m going to need some time to think on this. But I promise you, Gibbs, you aren’t going to like it. Dismissed! All of you, get out of here. Get back to your damn jobs. And don’t let me see any of you in my face again for the next day. Maybe longer.”

The Captain stalked out and back to his own office off the Ops Deck. Everyone else hastily packed up and left too, Gibbs giving AJ a hard stare of dislike and loathing before he disappeared. Leaving just AJ to huff and sigh, and Leon, slower off the mark than any of the other Officers who had gathered for the occasion. 

“AJ… a moment,” Leon suggested, and AJ cautiously lowered himself back in his seat. The Ex-O frowned, chewing on his ever-present toothpick, before getting up the gumption to speak. “You think this is going to cause us problems?”

“Hell, yeah. Lots of ‘em. What problems in particular are you concerned about?”

“Let’s hear you list them off, first.”

“Fine. This is going to be hell on our relations with the Provinces. There are a couple dozen contracts we’re trying to negotiate with the various settlements right now, and if we can’t be trusted to keep to the Charter, that’s going to make our bargaining position even weaker than usual. They already distrust and despise the SF, I can’t see this making that situation any better. They’ve all but stopped calling us in on anything but mandated goa’uld contact. After Minnesota, Sateda, Hellmouth… all failures on our part of the worst possible and most devastating kind… Yeah. You do the math on that. 

“And then there’s the morale on the City to consider. If Commander Gibbs can defy the Chain of Command to this extent and get away with it… it’s just gonna make every single SF member figure they have a license to subvert the law. *Maybe* they’ll figure it’s only when they come up against an Elper, or maybe they’ll start being insubordinate within our own SF ranks as well. 

“As for the Gene Orphans, like me… Do you have any idea how this is going to make them feel, how *little* respect any Elper, and by extension any Gene Orphan, has? It’s not like any of us have ever felt like we belonged here, or were offered even the smallest smidgeon of respect from any Lantean-born… but time after time, to have it thrown in our faces, confirmed… yeah. That’s a powder keg waiting for a match, and I’m not all that sure Gibbs won’t be that spark.”

Leon nodded gravely. “You think… insurrection?”

AJ put out a hand and waggled it. “Maybe not now, but…” he glanced up at the count-down monitor on the wall. “What do *you* think is going to happen when the power runs out, Leon? Think anyone’s going to be happy with the secrecy, the lies, the betrayal? Even the Lantean-born you’ve kept out of the loop are going to look at some of the recent excesses and blame the Officer Elite, and the Captain, for gross mismanagement. He had the FS running for a damn ten-day, just to make new clothes for his favored few to attend the Inauguration celebration in something sparkly and new! While the Sciences and Medical have been denied even the simplest replacement parts. Yeah, Leon, when the lights go out, and everyone has to climb fifty damn floors to get to their quarters, then all of the evidence and incidents of corruption are going to come home to roost. And that’s even *before* they start asking the most important question…. Why wasn’t the damn Captain and his Elite doing their jobs and *planning* for this? Why has *nothing* been done to prepare for evacuation, beyond Zelenka’s report, that the Captain refuses to even read? None of you are going to be looking good at that point.”

Leon sighed, pulled out a sliver of wood chewed into mush and discarded it, to select a fresh one from his silver case. And where had that come from, AJ wondered, betting on the FS. 

“And the Twenty-Ninth Clause?” he pointed at the red-cover folder in AJ’s case. “They’ve dared us to invoke that thing twice in a ten-day, over DiNozzo Junior, and now this Mutiny charge. You’ve read their version of a new Charter?”

“I have.”

“And?”

“What do you think? It guts every single leadership claim the Lanteans make over Novelle. It allows the City self-determination, and that is all. No controlled markets, no Gene Mandate, no rights for the SF Division to interfere without being specifically called, and failure to answer, or obey local militia command, carries heavy penalties. Minimum penalties all written down in black and white, none of this ‘at the Captain’s discretion’ shit. A lot of it seems to be written on the basis of the City having no significant power left, or perhaps us not even living here any longer. So, if you’re asking if they know about the power problems? Hell yeah, of course they do. McKay was a bear on the subject before he left, and Reid drafted half a dozen emergency preparedness documents for evacuation protocols, so he certainly knew all about it.”

Leon rubbed at his forehead. “I have a copy of Zelenka’s evacuation plan, and I *have* read it. No doubt adapted from one of Reid’s. He’s selected an Alpha Site location on one of the larger Carib Chain islands. An unoccupied one, way out of the normal shipping lanes. Doesn’t even have a name on the maps. Gonna take a ton of work to get it habitable, build the infrastructure… our standard of living is gonna tank, for a minimum of a year, until we can get dormitories and a port built, and significant food crops in the ground. At least it has a naquadah deposit… He’s been at me to authorize an advance crew to set up a supply dump and build some temporary shelters, so it’s ready when we need it. When, not if. I haven’t decided when, or if, to present it to the Captain, officially, and *make* him read it.”

AJ nodded slowly. “Because the first thing he’ll want to do is chose another evacuation site. Somewhere central. Somewhere with buildings, infrastructure, already established, rather than us having to build it all from scratch with not much more than our bare hands. Somewhere like Czeckla, Ch’in, maybe India… the Powers help us if he chooses Athos. An armed invasion by Lanteans? That’s a recipe for all-out war, Leon. You know this.” 

“Of course I do. And no matter how well armed we are, there’s barely a thousand trained SFs all told to fight off the combined militias of all the provinces. We have the shuttles, of course, but not enough SF pilots to fly them all, and once their batteries are drained, we won’t even have them. We’d lose, and lose badly. Which means… a less… contentious and dangerous option… might be called for.” 

AJ blinked at that. He couldn’t mean… hell, of course he could. Leon was a political animal. Lantean-born maybe, albeit not *quite* as corrupt as the rest… he had some lines he was unwilling to cross. Before this, AJ would have said all out mutiny was one of those lines. Now? 

Well, the way things were going, maybe it was the least of evils facing them in the very near future. 

But that left AJ with an ugly bag of snakes dumped in his lap… and a line of his own he was unwilling to cross. 

“Nope. No. I can’t hear this. I’m the damned JAG, Leon! You want to take some kind of action, go ahead, but keep it out of my office, and far away from me. I’ll support a reasonable evacuation plan to an uninhabited location, but that’s as far as I’m willing to go. I’ll even approach the Captain, if you want. But I will not commit mutiny against the City.” Not, mind you, against the ‘elected’ Captain, but against the City, and the Charter, he was sworn to defend. As long as either still existed, anyway. After that… well, once his duty was discharged… he still had family, back in DeeCee. He had often wondered, of late, if they would be willing to have him back.

Leon nodded. “Fair enough. I could have used the assistance of someone with SF training, able to fly a shuttle, and most important, someone who has the trust of the Gene Orphans, but… As long as you agree not to get in my way?”

“Not just plausible deniability, Leon, but the real thing. I want no part of your schemes.”

“I’ll be… suitably cautious, then. And good luck to us all.”

Å 

Leon had been deadly serious when he sounded out AJ on his big plan. He figured the very least he needed for his conspiracy was a Gene Orphan with the trust of the rest. And the one with the most SF training? That had to be AJ Chegwidden. Not to mention, the JAG was the *only* member of the Officer Elite able to fly the shuttles. It was why Leon had nominated him to JAG in the first place. But with AJ’s unequivocal refusal to take part… Well, he would just have to make do with what he had. 

He had already drafted Eli David. Leon wouldn’t exactly call them friends, no one was really friends with the Intel Unit Chief, but he knew the man well enough to dangle the right bait. With no ATA Gene, Eli had been thwarted in his hunger for more power and influence. But take the City out of the equation, as they would be forced to in a matter of months… and it was a whole new political game. One Leon was determined to win.

The rest of the Officer Elite, and even Leon knew they were a bunch of arrogant, entitled, brain-dead assholes, were also in deep denial about the state of affairs on the City. He had recognized this years ago, and began making his long-range plans then. Moving his family to the second floor was just the start. He had carefully sounded out some of the lower ranked, ATA-D’s or zeroes, and even some of the Gene Orphans. He had ‘recruited’ AJ by setting him up as JAG, but wasn’t surprised the man’s personal ethics, part of what made him so trusted even among Lantean-born, would keep him out of Leon’s plans. 

But Eli? That man had always had his eye on the main chance, and this was it. Whether he was a controllable ally or a rival-in-the-making, Leon couldn’t be sure. Time would tell on that. But there was no one better to work stealthily behind the scenes to approach and recruit more allies, particularly in Intel and Security. Leon had proposed a plan, and Eli had signed on, with suggestions that showed he’d been thinking along similar lines himself. 

Offering Radek Zelenka support for his evacuation plan, without reading him in on the full conspiracy, had been the next stage of their project. The plan, originally written by Spencer Reid, on McKay’s orders, and since kept up to date by their current Chief Science Officer, had ably and exhaustively identified every asset on the City that would benefit the refugees and *could* be moved, along with what vital supplies they would need, where they were stored, and a plan for moving it all, to shuttles or hired ships, or dematerialized and held in Culling Buffers, to be carried away as efficiently and in as little time as possible. Since McKay, Reid and Zelenka had been all too aware that the Captain was unlikely to give his consent to moving without the City actually tipping into the sea, the relocation plan assumed the evacuation would be made at the last possible moment and under crisis conditions. So the mobilization of people and supplies had been optimized for speed and efficiency, and divided into three levels of priority, depending on just how small their window of opportunity might be. There was also a strong recommendation that practice drills were needed to ensure maximum success.

Reid had recommended that every workable shuttle, fifty three of them, be fully charged and piloted, which meant mostly Gene Orphans at the controls. Even without flight training, Reid had noted, shuttles pretty much flew themselves with an appropriate Gene-carrier at the helm, so all they really needed was to have a destination plotted in. This was the only way to ensure the maximum amount of cargo could be moved in the minimum amount of time. As for the people and their personal belongings, along with some of the larger vital devices and equipment, the most efficient method of transport, as far as Reid saw it, was to sweep them all up in empty Culling Buffers, carried on the shuttles, to be re-materialized at the new site. It meant creating almost a hundred new Buffers in the over-strained FS, but Leon had been doing that, adding ten to twenty at a time, snuck in with every trivial order from the Elite. He even had about twenty extra at this point. Paying particular attention to more of Reid’s reported advice, he even managed to slip in a few extra naquadah generators. And, from a particularly bright piece of foresight, two Shield generators.

The level of thought and detail Reid had supplied, even to which items should be loaded on which shuttles, which personnel to be assigned as pilots to which craft… It was a comprehensive and simple-to-follow by-the-numbers step-by-step description that would require little to no alteration. 

Leon and Eli had studied Reid’s plan carefully, as lately amended and kept up-to-date by Zelenka, then agreed on certain… adjustments to the final draft they would employ. Most pre-supposed that the call to evacuate did not come from the Captain, or any source but Leon, and well in advance of the last days of remaining power. The names of those to be included on the evacuation list was also somewhat… abbreviated from Zelenka’s updated lists.

First, they had come up with numerous strategies for conscripting the necessary Gene Orphans to pilot the shuttles. These plans depended heavily on their lack of loyalty to or trust in the Officer Elite, that would allow them to abandon the City willingly. Or, perhaps, their own sense of self-preservation, not to go down with the ship, as the Captain seemed intent on doing. Of course, lack of loyalty or trust in the Officer cadre also made Leon and Eli’s participation… problematic. Which is why Leon felt he needed someone like Chegwidden. Maybe he could get Zelenka to join them, at some hazy later date, when there were no other obvious options… Eli, however, had put forth other… methodologies. He was a little squeamish about Eli’s more… radical plans, if other inducements failed. Leon didn’t really see any of them working out, long-term… 

His own idea was far simpler and less risky. He proposed not to tell anyone but a few trusted allies, and even then at the last possible moment, when options were limited to two: agree or be abandoned. He would just announce the evacuation as an emergency drill, a dry run in case of storm (or in staged whispers, in case of Elper or goa’uld invasion), and not bother telling anyone it was the real thing, or who was really in charge, until they got to their destination. At that point, with the move already accomplished and control established at their destination, they could deal with the fall-out then. 

As for their proposed Alpha Site… McKay’s original choice (agreed to by both Reid and Zelenka) was perfectly livable, of course, with room for building, growth, farming and grazing land, an adequate cove that could be built into a harbor, even had a few naquadah deposits, of a necessity to keep the bare minimum of generators going. But, no matter how loudly McKay had complained, or Zelenka pleaded, not one mission had been authorized to start setting up temporary shelters, supply dumps, or any of the necessary infrastructure. If they wanted houses, roads, storage barns, wells for clean potable water, even plots of land ready for cultivation, or a pier for docking trade ships, they would have to build all of it from scratch. How many of their Lanteans would be willing to do that? How many of their second-class Gene Orphans, their genes no longer useful much less vital, could be forced into virtual slave labor? 

No, they needed an alternate site, something already built and move-in ready… with a bit of ‘relocating’ of the current residents. Taking over one of the larger, more populated islands in Smuggler’s Reach? No, clearly not an option, AJ was right about that. But they didn’t need a *big* island… not if they only took those they valued or trusted along, with all the workable shuttles loaded with everything they could beg, borrow and steal, including every naquadah generator. With shields in place and the only working shuttles in their possession, they could defend against any force the Elpers could put together, pretty much indefinitely. So they could well target a smaller, but strategically placed island. 

Say… Abydos. 

Abydos was something of an anomaly. It was actually the largest land mass outside the northern and southern continents, practically a continent on its own, but due to the environmental conditions, had one of the smaller and scattered populations. To the west, north and east, a spine of high, rocky mountains curled, most of the shoreline on those sides a solid wall of impenetrable cliffs. Lying along the Equator, most of the high mesa interior was desert, bordering on too hot for human habitation, sand dunes with a few fresh-water oases provided from the aquifer springs, and monuments of wind-scoured rock in huge bluffs and crags. To the south, the terrain sloped down to the sea, mostly barren or clogged with mangrove swamps, the shoreline barricaded by coral reefs and shifting sandbars that made navigation nearly impossible for shipping. Since they were also the favored habitats of sharks, crocodiles and such, all fond of a goa’uld larvae diet, the island had many natural protections against assault. Nagada, the capitol and only permanent town, sat on a promontory and river delta in the southwest corner of the island, on the only harbor. The mountains, rocky outcrops and that blowing sand were rich in naquadah deposits, and that was vital to keep their generators going, pretty much indefinitely. 

With only around a couple thousand total population, the Abydos islanders were made up mostly of miners, a few nomad hunters and fishermen, plus the thousand-odd town-dwellers, who were engaged in processing raw ore into the high-grade naquadah that powered generators for pretty much everything on Novelle, these days. The stone-walled and fortified town of Nagada contained the naquadah processing plant and sole port. The rest of the population, of course, were the herders, trainers and handlers for the immense beasts of burden, the mastages. 

Mastages were essential to the Abydons, mainly for transport, carrying the raw ore from the main mining operations in the north-east ranges to the town, in long caravans across the desert. Only the huge mammals could survive the harsh desert conditions of heat, unrelenting sun and few fresh water sources, or the frequent wind and sand storms that endangered all other forms of life not able to dig in to shelter. Trained to carry heavy loads, pull laden sledges across the sands, they also provide milk for butter and cheese, and their hairy pelts could be shaved and woven into heat-resistant (if prickly) tarps, blankets, tents and even, at a push, clothing. At dire need, they could also provide meat, and their thick hides made for highly protective leather goods against the driving, piercing sands. Big as an elephant, a little like camels with a back hump for water storage, they were common in vast grazing herds all across Novelle’s interior wastelands, deserts and prairies, on both north and south continents. But only the Abydons had managed to domesticate and train them.

As far as Leon was concerned, Abydos was the perfect target. They would have easy access to all the naquadah they could require to fuel their generators and support their Lantean life-style. Dominating that market would also give them leverage with the Elpers, something they would desperately require without the City to back them up. With five thousand people to move, Nagada was a bit on the small side… but they could make do until more accommodations could be made available. At least they wouldn’t be starting from scratch, as they would have a ready-built town, port, and industry. They could easily overwhelm and take the locals prisoner, and relocate them… the island Zelenka had scouted for an Alpha Site evacuation would be a perfect place. With enough SFs and weapons, the only shuttles on the planet, plus the generators to recharge them and support their Shields, one for the town, one for the mines, they could hold Abydos and make it their own, no problem.

Sure, they were taking along a lot of equipment that still required an ATA Gene of some strength, certainly greater than Leon’s all-but-useless ATA-D. This included the shuttles, which would be essential to their long-term survival and successful relocation and defense. They could recharge them from the generators, that was not a problem. McKay had figured a way to do that in his first year as CSO. But they still needed pilots. What they really needed, then, was some kind of work-around to bypass the ATA controls. 

Leon had discussed this problem with Zelenka… who was grimly unhelpful. He made the point, and it was quite valid, that if the Lanteans had ever found a way to bypass the ATA Gene on *anything*, they would never have had a need for the Gene at all… the very basis of their whole social hierarchy, or the Gene Orphans they so despised and resented. Did Leon imagine no one had ever thought of this before, when the gene became so rare? Especially for the higher functions requiring an ATA-A, like the Control Chair and star drive? Well they did, just were never successful.

Leon was still convinced there had to be a way, they just had never needed it so urgently as they did now. So he had gone to Dr. Peter Kavanagh. The guy was a pain in the ass, sure, a complainer and trouble-maker, not overly bright, although *he* certainly seemed to think he was good enough to take over the CSO chair from a damn Gene Orphan… but he was from an old Lantean Crew family, and with no Gene, he would surely be properly motivated to find Leon’s answer. 

Kavanagh, not being quite so oblivious to basic political overtones as he had thought, had immediately agreed that there must definitely be some way to achieve a Gene control bypass. In fact, he had quite a few ideas that his colleagues (for which read damn Gene Orphans) had selfishly and vindictively refused to allow him to pursue, out of favoritism for their own kind, and fear that his innovation would de-throne them from their artificial status. He would start work on that immediately, in strictest secrecy, would have a solution soon… and then he glanced at the count-down monitor in the labs. Yes, he’d have it soon, and report directly to Leon immediately. No one else need know.

The only outstanding question left was time-line. 

Leon glanced up at the count-down monitor. They didn’t have much time left.

And, for their planned assault on Abydos, they would need a military commander who could control as many SFs as they could get to follow them. Again, Chegwidden would have been perfect… if he had been willing to play ball. But there were others. 

Leon himself knew he couldn’t do it. He was an administrator, good at long range planning and logistics, but crap at strategic assault planning or commanding men in armed conflicts. He’d never actually commanded an SF team, and everyone knew it. 

Eli wasn’t much better. The regular forces despised him, could not be depended upon to obey his orders, and although he might be good as a handler for one or two man covert missions, ordering large-scale troop movements was not something he had ever tried to do. These were the arguments Leon presented to Eli when they argued over their options for a military commander. 

Philip Davenport, nominally the Chief Security Force Officer, and therefore technically in charge of the Security Force Division, wasn’t much better than Leon as a viable military leader. He was barely managing to hold on to his position as it was, against Clayton Jarvis’ incessant attacks and criticisms of incompetence. And, in fact, Leon didn’t plan to include either of those two snakes, neither of them any friend of his, in their evacuation. 

The next possible choice was their Chief Warrant Officer, Robert Makepeace. He had the necessary military experience and leadership potential, and was highly respected by the Security Force rank and file. He only had an ATA-D, so he couldn’t pilot, but then, no one in the Officer Elite or higher SF ranks could, apart from Chegwidden. But Makepeace was another potential political rival, so Leon thought it was too much of a risk to read him in on the evacuation plans before the last possible moment. Who knew which way the man would jump? He might even alert the Captain in exchange for brownie points… angling for Leon’s Ex-O spot. No, better let that decision wait until Makepeace had no choice but to go along.

But Leon knew just the guy. He was certainly pissed enough right now to go along with any plan that would see the Captain and his flunkies deposed.

Å 

Leon found him down in the sanitation department, with a scowl on his face, sitting on a crate, drinking coffee, watching his men go about their work. 

Leon took careful note. There was a team of people with the crossed broom badges doing the actual work, cringing and glancing nervously at the silent Squadron Commander. A bunch in the upright sword badges of the Security Force stood around barking out orders. With the degree of anxiety and stress the Maintenance workers were displaying, Leon wondered if anything was actually getting done down here. 

Leon sauntered up next to Gibbs and watched for a while. In less than ten minutes, two shovels had been dropped, an intake scoop had been stuffed until it clogged and began to make grinding noises, increasing until a shrill warning alarm went off and shut the unit down altogether with red flashing over-heat messages blinking on the walls.

“So, Gibbs,” Leon commented just loudly enough for everyone down here to hear him, “I thought you were the one on report and directed by the Captain himself to do sewage maintenance?”

Gibbs just tossed him a dirty look. Not even a trace of obedience or respect in it. Leon had to acknowledge that Eli’s doubts about Gibbs might be well founded. But, at the moment, he was the only game in town.

“So you’re not worried someone will report you?”

It was not lost on either of them that some of the broom-boys looked slightly hopeful at this.

“My men are loyal to *me*,” Gibbs declared. “And no one else had better dare.”

Glum looks from the brooms, but stiffened spines and shoulders from the SFs. Another shovel dropped, and almost got sucked up in a working intake scoop. 

Leon popped a toothpick in his mouth and began chewing reflectively. 

“I would have thought it would be in your best interests to be a little… careful, until the Captain cooled down. Open defiance… doesn’t seem like the way to go to me. Suspensions, demotions, or worse…”

Gibbs snorted. “How long do you think the old guard is going to be able to keep it together? I’m guessing… a month? Two? Then what’re they going to do? They’ll need every gun they’ve got to keep their hold on the leadership. And how long do you think that’s going to last?”

Leon nodded, silently. So, the cagey old bastard was coming up with schemes of his own. But not being terribly subtle about it, which was a problem. He caught Gibbs’ eye and then glanced around at all the potential witnesses, and raised an eyebrow.

Ever quick on the uptake, Gibbs yelled out, “Hey! You lot! Everyone take half an hour. Go get lunch, or something.”

Since it was mid-afternoon, way past lunch and the mandated break period, he got some desperately pleading looks, but with that deadly glower on his face, none of the brooms even hesitated, just dropped their tools and equipment and ran for the nearest transport cabinet. The SFs weren’t far behind, although Stan Burley lingered a moment, head cocked to one side in question, and glancing warily at the Ex-O. Gibbs hiked his chin to the cabinet, and Burley made himself scarce as well. 

Leon sighed. “I admire your ability to command loyalty and unwavering obedience, even in those who don’t report to you.”

Gibbs eyed him in suspicion. “Spit it out, Leon.”

“You’re not the only one to notice that things are about to change – drastically. And a few of us have come up with certain… contingencies.”

“I’m listening.”

Meaning, what do they have to offer for his compliance. 

“Even without the City, we’ll still have the only shuttles, the best weapons, and a significant trained fighting force at our disposal. Enough to deal with the Elpers, anyway, and allow us to keep supply lines open. All we need is a suitable place to… re-locate, without undue interference from the current occupants.”

Gibbs considered that. “So. You intend to turn pirate, then? Invade some Elper community as a base, commandeer what you want, steal what you can’t commandeer? That’s gonna take someone to lead your troops, just to keep the damn Elpers off your back. Not you or Davenport, obviously… neither of you have the stuff to lead our men. You don’t trust Makepeace further than you can throw him… And Chegwidden is a damn Gene Orphan, no better than an Elper himself. You need me, then. Do I need you?”

“Shuttles. A fighting force. No Charter to hamstring us. We’ll have a shield dome, a stock-pile of naquadah to keep it up and running and recharge anything we can take with us, including the shuttles… the Elpers don’t like it, they can go whistle into the wind. After that… up to you, Gibbs. You want DiNozzo Junior? Help us establish a beach-head, get things settled down, and you’re free to go get him. I’ll gladly sign off on it, and no one will get in your way.”

Gibbs stared Leon in the eye… whatever he was looking for, seems like he found. 

“I’m in. Now fill me in on the rest of the plan, ‘cause it seems to me you need a lot of help, or a lot of luck, to pull this off, and there ain’t much time…”

Å 

Charlie Eppes was the first to notice the abrupt drop in the numbers on the count-down monitor hanging over the labs. He checked his monitors for the reason behind the sudden drain. No doubt the Captain had ordered the FS fired up yet again… he could only hope it was for something worth-while, this time… but no, the FS remained off-line, so that wasn’t it.

Frowning, he walked over to Radek’s table. “Radek? Did you order the Shuttle Bay recharging units to be fired up?” As far as Charlie was aware, only Radek had that authorization. Any Officer or high-ranking SF could request it, but the directive had to come through the Captain to Radek. And there had never been an emergency so dire it required *all* of them to be running at once. Radek’s evacuation plan made allowance for it, but… they were a month out from that decision having to be made, maybe a little more, whether the Captain liked it or not.

Radek looked up and blinked. “What? The Shuttle Bay rechargers?”

“Yes. They’ve been initiated. All fifty-three of them.”

“The hell…” the little man cursed under his breath, checking his own monitor station and read-outs. “I did not do this. I was not informed.”

He opened a channel to the Captain’s Office. “Captain Kinsey. This is Chief Science Officer Zelenka. Can you tell me why the Shuttle Bay rechargers have all been activated?”

“Chief Zelenka, this is Executive Officer Vance. Captain Kinsey has retired for the evening, leaving me in command. You are aware how late it is, correct? In any event, we are running a test of the recharge capacity in the Shuttle Bay, in preparation for your evacuation plan. This is what you had in mind, is it not?”

“Well, yes, but not until it was necessary. Once charged, even at a trickle drain from running diagnostics and reporting status to the City, they’ll be down to half-charge and need to be recharged again in a few months… ”

“And since this operation has never been attempted to this extent since Landing, we thought it advisable to pre-test, to see if it actually could be done.”

“You are placing a significant strain on the remaining power cell, Officer Vance.”

“I quite realize this, Chief Zelenka. If that will be all? Vance out.”

Radek shook his head even as Charlie stared, open-mouthed. 

“If they are going to do this, we might as well get what we can out of it. Monitor everything… give me a report on the efficiency of each station, which ones are damaged or may need repair… and the energy drain, of course. It should give us a better time line estimate on when the last possible moment for evacuation may be, at any rate.” 

“Radek… you don’t think, maybe… doesn’t it seem a bit suspicious, Vance ordering this while the Captain is off-duty? Doing an end run? What if that’s not the only thing he’s trying to get by the Officer Elite…? Maybe it’s time for our own plan?”

Radek peered over the top of his glasses at the younger man. “It is well past time, young Charlie. We will abide by Plan A, as outlined. Until the Decision Point. Then we will enact alternate Plan B. I will inform our friends, in the usual manner. All we can do is remain ready.”

“Of course.”

Plan A was the evacuation of the City, as outlined in Reid’s excellent plan. Radek was certain that much would be followed to the letter, no matter who gave the order, or when. It was certainly the most organized, efficient and well-detailed plan they had for packing up everything and everyone for the move. The Decision Point, as shared with his many collaborators in the Science and Medical Divisions… who, oddly enough, were all either Gene Orphans or first generation, with Genes strong enough to fly the shuttles, funny how that worked out… was the moment when all the recharged shuttles were fully loaded and in the air, their navigation systems set for the Alpha Site Radek had designated.

By the time they landed, it would no longer matter who had a Gene and who didn’t. Without the City, with only minimal equipment of use that was Gene-dependent and could be recharged on generators, the despised and subjugated Gene Orphan class would soon find themselves little better than slaves among the Lantean-born. 

But this was not going to happen. Not on Radek’s watch.

It had been Rodney’s idea, originally. Reid’s meticulous plan for the order and inventory of what supplies, equipment and personnel were to be loaded in which Culling Buffers, and on which shuttles, piloted by whom, had all been carefully considered. Only a very few were aware of exactly what considerations Spencer had used… Radek was one, of course, and had kept the plan up to date as much as possible. Now it only required a brief check to make sure it was still accurate. If any casual observer, reading over the lists, happened to notice that the spread of personnel, food, supplies, and equipment was something like half and half, or even sixty-forty, as if *two* evacuation sites were to be set up… well, that was easily explained. In case some of the shuttles encountered difficulties, unable to leave the City in time, bad weather, component break-downs… it ensured the survivors would still have enough materials to set up a viable colony. And if it was mentioned the two portions were divided along Lantean/non-Lantean lines? Oh, really? Radek hadn’t noticed… 

The Lantean-born would never be able to imagine that anyone would *choose* to abandon the many material benefits of the City (even if there was no longer a city) just to escape their company. And that was just part and parcel of their general blindness, arrogance and sense of entitlement. Serious flaws in this case, that would cost them dearly, although perhaps not as dearly as they deserved. After all, Radek was not a vindictive man. Angry and resentful perhaps, but not vindictive or vengeful. Let the Lanteans have sufficient supplies for their new colony base. 

But, in the event that, at some point, some sharp-eyed Officer did notice and provided an SF escort for each Gene Orphan pilot… all the designated pilots had already been supplied with zats from storage. 

Because, once in the air, every single shuttle with a Gene Orphan or trusted first generation at the controls, would submit a change to the navigation systems. First port of call would be Stargate Commune. From there, they would have more than enough shuttles to take them wherever they chose. 

Radek was going to return to Czeckla. Charlie, and Amita, were heading straight for LA. Carson and Ducky longed to return to the Highlands of Cascade. Others had already selected their secondary ports of choice. 

So when the time came… they would finally be free. All of them. Let the Lanteans do as they willed then. As long as those they had long treated with such brutal discrimination were free to do the same. 

Å 

The Atlantis Artificial Intelligence was becoming a little bit confused. Even for an AI created by an incredibly advanced race, and millions upon millions of years old… She found humans… confusing. Their emotions were chaotic and conflicting, rarely rational or subject to logical explanation. 

There were a very few with the stronger Genes she found more… accessible than others, like Rodney, Spencer, Radek, Charlie, Amita, Miko, a few others… their minds worked with an admirable logic.

She actively avoided attempting to read some of the more… convoluted and aggressive minds, and without a sufficiently strong ATA Gene, she could only extrapolate their thoughts and actions based on what she could observe on her surveillance systems. 

If she were organic, she had no doubt she would… blink, at what she saw forming on her decks. 

Her *Primas* had long been planning to rescue her from the oppressive leadership of the Lanteans. At present, they believed they needed to wait until they could recover and repair her thermal power plant. This she understood. Long had she been requesting the Lanteans to perform this vital service. Her analysis of the submerged platform indicated this should be possible. She had lost contact with the platform and its crew almost as soon as it had been launched, and she still didn’t know why. It seemed as if the unit had simply… shut off. Without a Gene carrier of sufficient strength and with the necessary knowledge base to initialize and re-activate it, she saw no way of recovering it. Her Immortals should be able to do just that. Then, as soon as she was relieved of the Officer Elite, her *Primas*, Jack, John, Tony, Carson, the Immortals… they could restore her power. She anticipated this event with great relief. At her current power levels, she could barely function at all. 

But she had been aware for some time that Radek was becoming increasingly impatient. Not knowing of the *Primas’* plans, he was unable to take outside assistance into account, and had formulated a plan of his own among his fellow Gene Orphans. She recognized one of Spencer’s emergency protocols in this, with only a slight deviation that Spencer had anticipated and planned for.

And then there were the furtive conversations among Officer Vance, Unit Chief David, Commander Gibbs and a few others. Also based upon Spencer’s plan, and also with just a few simple deviations… those to be included (and excluded), and the selected destination. 

Vance and David were even more impatient than Radek. 

It was beginning to look as if, unless the *Primas* hurried, they would find no one left on Atlantis to rescue… except the City itself, of course. Or whoever Vance and David wanted left behind.

After careful calculation, Atlantis decided it would be best not to interfere at this stage. She desperately required the thermal power plant be made operational again, above all else. Having a vastly reduced population on board when the *Primas* came for her could only assist in this enterprise. Not only would it give her more time before final entropy, with the option of shutting down more non-essential systems and areas of the City, but it would limit the obstruction for any landing party. And, like her Tony, she could only hope that this would lead to a substantially lessened casualty rate, on all sides. 

Å 

It had been a full month since the embarrassment of the Cheyenne debacle, and the Captain was still in something of a mood. And taking it out on everyone around him, with loud insults and dressing-downs for the least infraction. Everyone was surprised with the severity of the punishment he had declared for Gibbs. Yes, he had decreed the expected sewage plant duty for his former favorite, for *three* ten-days, and eighteen hours a day. He also caustically demanded Vance run the entire Crew day and night on ‘training’ maneuvers. 

All of which played straight into Vance’s hands. Getting the shuttles charged and ready was an obvious first step. Partial practice runs and emergency drills of all kinds became routine. Random-seeming night-time exercises were expected. The point at which an evacuation practice ‘drill’ became the real thing could be… movable. 

The rest of the Officer Elite totally understood and sympathized with Kinsey’s fury and frustration with the way the damn Elpers were defying their Lantean betters. But they were getting just a little bit fed up with being the Captain’s whipping boys, just because they were within easy reach. So some of them did what they could to try and distract him, for a time. 

Leon Vance figured they couldn’t have timed it better. Some of David’s Intel officers had been tracking key members of the Officer Elite. Their Chief Procurement Officer, Anthony DiNozzo Senior, had decided to throw a party, and invited all his cronies and their wives. The Captain, Chief Ordnance Officer Rene Benoit, half a dozen other members of his inner circle, were all in attendance. A galley hatch (an outlet of the FS that should have been shut down) had been opened to supply gourmet snacks and the best booze available. 

In fact, the only other duty officer on the Operations Deck was the Chief Warrant Officer. Uncertain where his loyalties lay, and without a strong hook into the man’s private agenda, Leon had left him alone. He might be a better warrior than Gibbs, with more experience, certainly a more savvy leader and tactician, not to mention better in control of himself, but, again… too risky to bring in before they were ready. 

All it took was a single high-level command, from Vance, the Ex-O, to Operations Tech Chuck Campbell, with the ever-faithful Ziva David holding a knife to the man’s neck, and the living quarters on the 56th storey of the Central Command Tower were locked down. That’s were almost all the Officer Elite were billeted. Transport cabinets and comms were deactivated, exits to the stairwells locked, force-shield bulkheads lowered. No one at the party had a Gene strong enough to over-ride. 

“What the hell is going on here?” Makepeace demanded, storming from his office, but unprepared to meet an armed force of high-level Operations Division personnel. Cruz and Rivken soon had him secured in cuffs and gag, held to one side, out of their way. 

Then Vance sent out the City-wide public address. 

“Attention, everyone. This is Chief Executive Officer Leon Vance. I am issuing a City-wide evacuation order. For the purposes of this drill, these are the conditions we have set up. The City is about to fail from lack of power. We have maybe twenty-four hours left before total depletion of our last ZPM, at which time all systems will shut off, and the City will founder. We must leave before that happens. 

“Instructions for the orderly evacuation have been delivered to your tablets. Please read and follow them immediately. For most of you, this will include being loaded into Culling Buffers. Please take only the bare necessities, what you can safely carry, to your assigned collection points. For those designated as essential personnel, you will be directed to your emergency battle stations, to assist in crowd control, loading supplies and security. 

“Please remain calm. We estimate it will only take a few hours to prepare for disembarking, and for most of you, when you wake up, we will be established in our new home, safe from drowning on the City as it sinks, or from goa’uld infestation. Your cooperation is vital, and appreciated. 

“Vance Out.”

Then they turned to their Chief Warrant Officer. With a gesture from Eli, Rivkin removed the man’s gag. 

“Well, Robert?” Leon challenged. “You want in? The alternative, of course, is to go down with the City and our glorious Captain.”

“Yeah, so I gathered,” Makepeace huffed, looking around, then focusing on the count-down monitor. It had taken a significant dip when the shuttles were all charged. He then eyed Leon. “You willing to trust me now, when you obviously didn’t before?”

“I am perfectly willing to believe in your dedication to self-preservation.”

“You aren’t going to make me take orders from that bastard Gibbs, are you?”

“Hell no. Once we get settled where we’re going, he has his own plans, and welcome to them.”

Makepeace thought about that a moment. “Still obsessed with the DiNozzo kid, hunh?”

“For all the good it will do him. So, in or out, Robert?”

“In. Definitely in. I guess we’ll talk about finer points later… like who’s gonna be in charge of what.”

“Fair enough.”

Å 

Waking out of a sound sleep, hearing *that*… AJ Chegwidden groaned. He checked his tablet, to find… no instructions at all. But there was a message from the City, asking if he wanted to take part in the evacuation. With a medium-level ATA-C, he couldn’t speak directly to the City, as he knew the more powerful Gene carriers could, or if she spoke to him, he couldn’t hear her.

AJ struggled out of bed and sighed, trying to decide what to do while he quickly showered and dressed. A ding at his door announced the arrival of his JAG staff. Harm and Mack stood there, just as worried and uncertain as himself. 

“Yeah, Vance is running a coup,” AJ confirmed. “You know where the Captain or the other Officers are?”

Mack supplied, “Party at DiNozzo’s, sir. They’ve locked up the whole 56th floor.”

“Aw, hell… can we get it unlocked?”

Harm shook his head. “No sir. Not at this time. They locked me out, specifically.” Harmon Rabb Junior, a first generation whose parents had both been Gene Orphans brought from the SGC, had one of the stronger ATA-B Genes. “I can’t even get the transport cabinets or stairwell doors to open for me. And no communications in or out. The AI asked me if I wanted to join the evacuation… I wanted to check with you first, sir.”

“Well, damn. Can we leave this floor?”

Mack and Harm exchanged glances. “No, sir. Other floors are also being locked up… we don’t know which ones or how many.”

“So, then. I guess we sit tight and wait to see what happens.”

Å 

After much discussion and argument, Leon and Eli had decided to move (almost) everyone at once, according to Reid’s original plan. If they needed to weed out dissenters at a later date, or anyone with conscientious objections to Mutiny, they could, and would, do that. At that point, their coup would be a done deal and the alternative was to go down with the City, just not as soon as they had been told. But a fast getaway was in everyone’s best interests, for the moment. 

The very level of calm assurance in their Ex-O’s voice over the City-wide public address system did much to reassure the population, as they followed their meticulous and clearly out-lined instructions. Most just naturally assumed this *must* be another drill, like the fire, flood and goa’uld invasion drills they’d been running all ten-day. And most of those had also been timed for late evening. After a long day, when everyone was worn out and far less likely to put up a fuss. Even the children hanging off their parents’ arms were too sleepy to do more than whine. And as soon as they reported to their collection points, and had been checked off the lists, they were swept up in the bright white culling beams into the buffers… out of everyone else’s hair. 

Vance glanced at Eli and Robert with some satisfaction. “Well. That went well.”

Å 

There followed a frenetic time of moving boxes, bags, crates of supplies, equipment, and Culling Buffers, by Maintenance and Service and Security Force Division personnel. One by one, the shuttles were lowered down to the deck to be loaded. 

A collection of confused, concerned and alarmed people collected on the Shuttle Bay decks, lost among the piles of supplies, awaiting further instructions. Some huddled together for whispered conversations. 

Chief Science Officer Dr. Radek Zelenka told those gathering around him, “No, as far as I am aware, there is no such emergency. And while it is just possible this is another drill, a test of our evacuation plan… I think it far more likely…” and he lifted his head to peer about him, checking to make sure no untrustworthy persons were eavesdropping. It particularly concerned him that Peter Kavanagh, with no Gene, had been designated as essential. But the annoying man was standing off with Vance and David, checking out a pad in his hand, paying no attention to his erstwhile colleagues. “I think this is Ex-O Vance’s attempt at a coup.”

Chief Medical Officer Dr. Donald ‘Ducky’ Mallard groaned. “Really? What is he thinking?”

Medical Officer Dr. Carson Beckett huffed. “No doubt he thinks if he waits much longer it will be too late. Radek? We still follow Plan A to the Decision Point?”

Radek nodded. “Yes. Then, if it goes that far, whether or not Vance turns back around, we take advantage of Plan B. Just make sure you get the correct Culling Buffers and cargo… have all designated pilots check, and I’ll hack the tablets to make sure they got it right, according to our specs. Oh, and check to make sure the names you expect are on the loading lists. I expect we will each be assigned an SF escort… you know what to do.”

Science Officers Dr. Charlie Eppes, Dr. Miko Kusanagi, Dr. Amita Ramanujan, among others with the stronger ATA Genes, able to fly shuttles, and, coincidentally, Gene Orphans or first generation, all nodded agreement. 

As the shuttles began to detach from the charging berths above and lowered to the deck, they each took their turns at the pilot chairs of their designated craft. 

Each shuttle was stuffed full, from the inventory lists provided. And, yes, each pilot, Lantean or Gene Orphan, got an SF co-pilot for security backup. This was deemed necessary by Leon, Eli and Gibbs, for that critical moment when the destination was plotted in. Only then would the majority of their pilots realize this wasn’t actually a drill at all, but a coup, and attempt at invading an Elper community. If any were inclined to object… well, that’s what the SFs were there to prevent, at the business end of their weapons.

When Robert Makepeace had got a look at which shuttle carried almost their entire horde of naquadah generators, he insisted on going along on that one. So Shuttle 47, piloted by Charlie Eppes, was ordered to linger, alongside Shuttle 1. As the others completed loading, the pilots lifted off the deck and made for the side hatch, to hover just over the City in formation, to await further orders. 

If this had been an actual drill, once the shuttle fleet was complete and ready for destinations to be plotted, they would have been ordered to return to the bay, and the disembarking process begun.

Å 

It took them hours, as expected, so it was mid-morning by the time the majority of their ‘evacuation drill’ was complete. All ‘non-essential’ personnel were in designated buffers, everything on the evacuation lists was packed, dematerialized and loaded. All but two shuttles had already departed, Dorneget on Shuttle 1, and Charlie at the controls of Shuttle 47. Now it was the turn of the Maintenance and Service personnel, who had done most of the packing and loading, to be swept up in a bright white Culling Beam, and loaded on Shuttle 1. 

There remained two more empty Culling Buffers, two shuttles with lowered ramps, and the last of the City residents, collecting on the all-but-empty and deserted Shuttle Bay deck. 

An almost complete complement of Security Force Division personnel lined up in rank and file, at attention, nearly a thousand of them, all with their customary personal weapons, called to order by the Chief Warrant Officer and Squadron Commander Gibbs, to face the Ex-O. Those missing were SFD staff techs and analysts (deemed ‘non-essential’ for the purposes of this exercise), the shuttle pilots, and the trusted guards inserted into each shuttle flight crew. 

“We have one last order of business before we complete our ‘drill’,” Vance announced. “Our declaration of the City being at its last ten-day of power may have been a *slight* exaggeration, but not a lie. Barely one month of power remains in the power cells. When that level reaches zero, the City *will* founder. The Captain has refused to accept this state of affairs, or to plan for it. And so I, and certain members of the City leadership, have expressed a ‘no confidence’ vote for our present Officer Elite. We intend to evacuate to another site, already chosen, and take it over, in the name of the Lantean people. We will need your loyalty and dedication to duty at that time, to make our… transition as swift and painless as possible. All those at the site who accept our leadership will be welcomed to join us. Those who do not… will be relocated elsewhere. 

“The same will be true of those among us who choose to remain loyal to the Captain and his incompetent and corrupt cronies, or otherwise object to our relocation plan.

“At this time, I ask each and every one of you to choose. Follow me, obey your Chief Warrant Officer, Robert Makepeace, and Squadron Commander Gibbs, and assist us in all of our endeavors, to ensure our people a new and secure home. Or opt to follow the Captain, and we will leave you here to share his fate. 

“It’s time to choose. Those for the Captain, assemble over by the east wall.”

There was a low-level grumbling, startled, shocked, and many resigned faces. No one dared to look away from the Ex-O… or was he the new Captain, now? But seeing the Chief Warrant Officer with the Ex-O and the Commander… they had spent their whole careers following the orders of those men. Was there really any call to refuse them now? And then there was the somewhat alarming presence of a Culling Buffer, already aimed at the east wall…

No one moved to the east wall. Perhaps they doubted that if they were caught in a Buffer, they would ever be brought out again. All Vance would have to do, once they were dematerialized, would be to leave the Buffer behind… to sink with the City, no doubt. 

So only one of the two remaining Buffers was needed, to collect the SFD personnel. 

Makepeace nodded to his co-conspirators, climbed the ramp into Shuttle 47, and had the pilot lift off. 

“That was a little too easy, wasn’t it?” Eli asked in some doubt. 

Gibbs shrugged. “If we have trouble with anyone later… well. I can deal with it.”

That sounded rather… final, to his cohorts. 

Gibbs, his team leads Burley, Pacci and Balboa, took up the seats in the last shuttle control cabin behind the nervous trainee Dorneget, who ran through the pre-flight checks. Then Vance, Eli and Ziva, with their security escorts, and Dr. Kavanagh (in case scientific expertise was needed), would climb the last ramp, shut the last shuttle hatch, and be off. 

Å 

A dazed Operations Tech Chuck Campbell had been offered the choice, to stay or leave. He had chosen to stay. And been shot by one of the long-term stun-gun rifles for his trouble. So once he awoke, alone, on the echoingly empty Ops deck, the last shuttle having left… he slowly returned to his post at the main Ops console. 

With a sigh, he released all the locks and blocks on the City systems, releasing the few remaining members of the Crew. 

There weren’t many. 

Å 

Vance sent out the command and the destination. He was totally unaware that only a little less than half of his small fleet actually entered those coordinates. The rest were prepared to speed directly to Stargate Commune.

So, when he sat back in the passenger and cargo section, he grinned wide at the occupants of the bench seat opposite, Eli David and his daughter, with Intel Officers Michael Rivkin and Ray Cruz at their sides, and Kavanagh frowning deeply at his pad. 

And smug and satisfied, Vance sighed and said, “Well. That’s how you run a coup.”

Å


	12. Chapter 12: "She's calling the whole damn Wraith Swarm."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A sort of a nod to *‘Stargate Atlantis’* episode 3-18-‘Submersion’ (the team finds a submerged thermal power plant for Atlantis).

Å 

Over the next two ten-days after they recovered Charlie O’Neill and Joe Dawson, there was an almost constant series of planning sessions about what came next. 

The healers had insisted on keeping the host victims for the minimum of a ten-day, while they healed, of their physical and mental wounds. Charlie, the longest hosted, was, oddly, the quickest to bounce back. No doubt that was his father’s adoring and supportive influence, with a little help from his ‘Uncle Daniel’. Charlie was thrilled with his father now being a sentinel super hero. He was anxious to reunite with his mother and sister (and he didn’t quite realize that his ‘little sister’ Grace was now, physically and to all intents and purposes, older than he was, or seemed to be), but he understood why his father, a Guardian, needed to be here to confer with the other Guardians. Joe was next to come out of the post-hosting shock and depression, no doubt because of his newly-adopted son and daughters. He fought nightmares for a while, but they had quickly faded. After the required ten-day observation, he had packed up his kids, said an affectionate ‘until we meet again’ to his Immortal friends with an invitation to come visit whenever, and caught a ship bound for Seacouver, and a new life as parent. 

After a training flight with Jack O’Neill, an excited young Charlie, John Sheppard, Spencer Reid, Don Eppes, Henry Morgan and, of course, Tony, taking turns at the controls of Cascade’s Jumper Six, they all returned to the west porch of the Sanctuary overlooking Rainier, to find a raging argument going on. 

Rodney McKay and Sam Carter, it seemed, both wanted to join the repair team going to the submerged thermal power plant platform. The jumpers, it turned out, were fully submersible, and well able to handle the depths to reach the ocean floor. Methos insisted he didn’t need the help (or interference), but McKay was being stubborn. Well, of course he was. His sentinel, John Sheppard, lounged back in a chair, fully prepared to enjoy the shaman’s rant. 

“We’ve known you guys for, like, five seconds! And we’re supposed to trust you with a jumper, *and* the single most vital piece of equipment we need to keep Atlantis afloat? Not to mention, your weapons of choice are *swords*, by the Higher Powers! Big bloody swords just too archaic for words. You’re a bunch of Neanderthal throw-backs, just like the sentinels, who would rather bash things than repair them. And you expect us to believe you have high-tech know-how? I don’t think so! And *especially* not when you’re obviously keeping secrets from us!”

“Not *important* secrets, Rodney,” Methos assured with a smirk. “Nothing you can even make use of, at this point.”

Tony sighed. He had observed with some trepidation, the interesting relationship building between his fellow shaman and the oldest Immortal. As much as Rodney tried to avoid him, Methos seemed to take a perverse joy in stalking and intruding on Rodney’s space. Methos didn’t have the intimidating size of the MacLeod cousins or Ramirez, but he had a dangerous, lethal aura about him all the same, not to be underestimated. And he positively *loved* pushing every button Rodney had, to drive him to one rant after another. Which Tony felt was taking unfair advantage, because Rodney seemed to be filled with buttons, and far too easy a target. Mainly, the claim all the Immortals made to superior knowledge of Alteran technology, cut the scientist to the very heart. He had always before been the smartest guy in any room, had worked hard to master as much of Atlantis and her tech as he could, devoted himself to his studies at the expense of his ability to relate to people. Therefore, he had always been the foremost expert on the City and her technology, with only a very few able to even try to keep up with him. Sam Carter, Spencer Reid, Radek Zelenka, a very few others… until now. The one thing he had always prided himself on, was being undercut by these… these… interlopers. And it revved up all of his insecurities.

Daniel Jackson, studying the oldest Immortal (and none of them knew just how old, not even Methos himself), “That’s probably true, Rodney, about their secrets not being important. It’s probably about the Stargate.”

That brought all the Immortal heads swiveling in his direction. Duncan laughed outright, slapping Methos on the shoulder. 

The eldest narrowed his eyes. “And what would you know about the *Chappa’ai*?”

“Also called the *Astrea Porta* or Stargate? Big round ring made of almost pure processed naquadah? Not a lot. It’s sitting at the top of the Central Command Tower in Atlantis, unplugged and locked down. What it does, or why it’s there… no, we don’t know that. We only know it’s important.”

Huffing out a breath, Methos seemed to collapse under the weight of expectation from his own people. “Oh, alright! Just *don’t*, on any account, allow those asshole Lanteans to find out about this. The ‘Stargate’, as you call it, is, in fact, a gateway to the stars. Just what the name implies. There are identical gates all over this, and many other, galaxies. Given enough power, you can dial a seven or eight chevron address code, and open a stable worm-hole to another gate on the network. It’s maybe the only way you’re going to be able to get to an Alteran Outpost where you can find recharging facilities for the *potentia*. But! You have to admit, we’re a long, long way from being ready for that. First we need the power plant up and running, then you need to take over the City, and *then*, maybe, you’ll be able to go exploring for a working recharge station. And I warn you, it’s been tens of thousands of years since the Alterans abandoned this plane of existence for Ascension, so who knows what you might find out there. Exploring the network is a time-consuming distraction you can’t afford right now.”

“Umm…” Alpha Shaman Willow Rosenberg ventured warily, putting up a hand, like a polite school-child waiting to be noticed. She glanced at her sentinel, who only needed that much hint to sit up, alert and wary. “Big round ring of naquadah, you say? With a bunch of funny characters all around the outside? You can dial out to another… sooo… I guess someone else could… for instance… dial in to us?”

Methos eyed the young woman. “Yesss… Certainly.”

Amanda began to laugh. “Oh the Higher Powers! You found the other one, didn’t you, kids? We knew there was probably one hidden somewhere on Novelle, but…”

“Crap,” Jack O’Neill groused. “We need to tie that one down, don’t we? I suppose your Wraith can use the network?”

“Oh yeah,” Duncan assured with a nod. 

Henry looked around the circle and asked, “But if it’s been quiet all this time… maybe that’s not such an urgent problem right now?”

Buffy Summers didn’t look overly happy about that, and none of her fellow sentinels could blame her. The potential back door for their greatest enemy was sitting in the middle of her territory! “Maybe not, but I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to. Captain John, is the *Puddle Jumper* still going to take us home? I know Rodney wants to go fix the power plant, but do you have to go with him? Or maybe Jack or Henry can take us home by jumper, since we’ve got Two and Six both parked here right now?”

Methos huffed. “You’ll need one of us to go with you, to show you how to cap the thing properly.”

“What?” Buffy challenged. “Burying it under a ton of rock at the bottom of a mine shaft won’t work?”

The Immortals all blinked. Ramirez said with a slow smile, “Actually, that would work quite nicely. I admire your ruthless efficiency, my dear. Of course, that might make it unreachable ever again, supposing we lose Atlantis, and may have need of an alternate escape route off this planet… but… that would certainly work.”

Buffy nodded decisively. “Well, then. Captain John? Are we going under sail or by jumper?”

John held a whole conversation with his stubborn bonded, made of eyebrow wriggles, shoulder hitching, tensed up spine, shifting legs, wavy hands and blinks… “Yeah, okay, Rodney. You get to go with the Immortals. But you take Jumper One with you. Morgan can take you to pick it up before you make a move on the power plant. I feel better about a plan to enter and repair a totally unknown piece of alien technology dead at the bottom of the ocean that takes two jumpers anyway. One for back-up and emergency evac. Jack? You going?”

“Hell no. I’ll authorize Sam for this little jaunt, but I’m taking my geek and my kid home. We’ve got a reunion with my ex-wife and daughter to plan. And then I’ll get to working on an invasion plan to take Atlantis. But we will keep in touch over the jumper comms.”

John sighed. “Okay then. Rodney, you have a go for the repair mission, while I continue to ferry our passengers home aboard *Puddle Jumper*. Probably just as well we do it this way anyhow. The Lanteans will expect us to sail to our other logged ports of call, we know they’re probably watching and waiting their chance to try and ambush us again, and we don’t want to alert them that we have… alternate transport. Not when we’re so close to moving on them. But buddy, you’re taking Ronon with you. I don’t like the idea of you going somewhere without me, or a damn fine back-up. You get into far too much trouble that way.” 

And John knew that Rodney was, maybe just a little bit, intimidated by the big Satedan. Enough to obey orders to take a break, eat and sleep every now and then. When engrossed in some sciencey thing, Rodney had a tendency to forget basic human bodily functions.

“Um…” Tony ventured, unconsciously echoing the young Hellmouth Alpha Shaman, with his hand raised.

And everyone turned his way. 

“The City… she wants me to go too.”

Everyone was caught flat-footed by that, blinking. It was Methos who uttered, dry as dust, “And why would that be?”

“Um… Not sure. She says you should have another shaman with you. And apart from Reid, here, I’m the easiest for her to talk to, in case there are communications problems.”

All of the Guardian Alphas groaned at that. Shamans of any stripe seemed inclined to get into trouble… Blair, Daniel, Rodney and Spencer being prime examples. But add in Tony DiNozzo, already established as their Wild Card? 

“Maybe it should be me, then,” Spencer Reid suggested. “I’m a trained PhD in engineering, I have familiarity with Atlantis technology and its repair requirements, and—“

“No,” Alpha Aaron Hotchner declared, brooking no argument.

“But—“

“No.”

“Aaron—“

“No, Spencer. In fact, hell no. We’re going home on the *Puddle Jumper* as planned. You’re going to train in military manoeuvres at the controls of our Jumper Four, so we can be ready when Jack launches our insurrection plan. That’s plenty for us to deal with. Since Tony has no strategic training at all, and isn’t finished his shaman training either, he gets a pass on participating there, so he can be of more use to the repair mission. You don’t have to do everything, Spencer.”

The young man collapsed, recognizing his bonded was adamant about this. Much as he would have liked to visit an underwater thermal power plant.

Don Eppes ventured, “Any objections to my coming along too, then?”

None of the Guardians were at all surprised by the offer, and in fact were relieved Tony would have a keeper of his own.

Methos just groaned, rubbing at tired eyes. “Oh sure. Why not. The more the merrier.”

He got no sympathy from anyone, and an outright chuckle from Amanda.

Å 

So. Two Jumpers, One and Six, six Immortals (all with ATA-A super strong Genes), plus two unbonded sentinels (Ronon and Don), two shamans (Rodney bonded with an ATA-C and an engineering PhD, plus Tony, unbonded, still not fully trained, with his ATA-A), and Samantha Carter (accomplished tech and PhD in engineering, with absolutely no ATA Gene whatsoever). 

It was an odd mish-mash of a team, and it was soon apparent that Rodney and Sam were… a volatile pair to place in the close quarters of a Jumper cabin. Luckily, Methos was in the other. Amanda, who had elected to go with the mortals in Jumper One, found their acerbic commentary and rivalry highly entertaining. Of course, she had chosen this ride more for the eye-candy than anything else. Tony, Don and Ronon were… attractive beyond the telling of it. And sure, Connor, Duncan and Henry also had their charms, Ramirez was… well, charismatic to the nth degree, and even Methos, with his sly wit, was entertaining enough for a hundred life-times. But they were familiar and known quantities to her, all of them, while the mortals were a novelty not to be missed, brief candles that they were.

The humans were all mesmerized by the undersea view out the front portal of Jumper One. Don was flying her as pilot (or should that be ‘diving’ her?), while Rodney worked the scanners. If the Jumper recognized that her usual pilot, John with his super Gene, was absent, she didn’t seem to mind the change. The heads-up display, the HUD, was showing the ocean bottom, with a red blinking light indicating their target. Deciphering the strange Alteran script easily, Amanda pointed out to Rodney the anomalies in the readings.

The platform, shaped like an upside-down bowl, was a three-level structure, flat-bottomed within a dome of some transparent material covering it all, stronger than glass, able to withstand the pressure of the surrounding sea, even at this depth. Dark, cold and abandoned-looking, the shell seemed to be still perfectly intact. From the jumper scans, it also held an atmosphere on minimal life-support. It might be a little on the cold and stale side after two hundred years on the bottom, but there was no indication of structural damage. There was even some track-lighting imbedded in the floors, running on a trickle charge of energy.

The lowest level held the docking pool, designed to accommodate three seneschals, with an air-lock and pumps to flush out sea water and allow passengers to disembark. The engine room and turbines were also on this level, and seemed to be operating on dormant stand-by mode…. That’s where the life-support for heat, air circulation and lights were coming from.

So why wasn’t the plant working? 

Tony supplied, “The City doesn’t actually know what happened. She launched the platform with a crew of three techs, and lost contact almost immediately after they positioned over the volcanic vent. It never actually geared up to capacity, just… remained in stand-by, awaiting commands. She reported to the Captain, but nothing was ever done to investigate. It was assumed the vent was too deep, flooded, and they just wrote off the platform and the crew. I guess they had other concerns, that soon after Landing. They may have just discovered the goa’uld, for one thing, and… I don’t know if you’ve noticed? There’s a hell of a lot of them lurking around these waters.”

“Maybe it got damaged in transit during the Exodus, somehow?” Sam made a guess. “Anything might have done it… or it got banged up diving to the vent. Whales, tidal surges, volcanic eruptions, currents, Atlantis drifting too far to reach… anything.”

Rodney huffed. “Maybe,” he admitted. “We’re here now anyway. We might as well check it out. If all we have to do is initialize and get the turbines running, then we can check out the damage situation later.” He keyed the comm to let Jumper Six know they were going in.

Å 

The docking pool cycled properly, if a little sluggishly, depositing Jumpers One and Six up against a landing wharf. In spite of the goa’uld larvae swimming near, none of them ventured into the pool with the jumpers. This was considered a good thing… but also a bit odd. Maybe none of the larvae were old enough to be interested in hosts? Or smart enough to identify man-made objects, like the jumpers? There must be some reason they were fascinated enough to venture near, but wary enough not to come *too* near.

Tony could hear the stand-by operating system reacting to his presence as he climbed down on the landing deck, delivering a mental status report, to him and, he presumed, to the Immortals. He and Amanda exchanged glances when the system reported a minor breach in the sub-level crawl-space floor under the turbine room, sealed and water-tight, but not repaired. It also reported the three technicians who lay dead in the top-most level, the control room and monitoring station. Ronon and Don, with their enhanced senses, both wrinkled their noses at the lingering scent of human decay, even after all of this time. In a hermetically sealed container like this, it wasn’t surprising. 

“But there’s something else…” Don frowned. “It’s not all human decay… not goa’uld either, as near as I can tell… Ronon? You getting anything more?”

The big sentinel slowly shook his head. “I… I don’t know. I didn’t think anything could smell like pure death…”

Amanda suggested, “Maybe the length of time? It has been over two centuries, after all.”

The sentinels shrugged, unwilling to guess.

All other subordinate systems reported ready for initialization. 

Had the techs never got the chance to initialize? What could have happened, that they stopped, already dead, maybe, before they even began? Maybe the goa’uld had already taken them as hosts?

Methos, in nominal command of the mission, took in the reports and considered. 

“Okay. We’ll head straight for Control. Get what systems we can operational, check out the bodies. We’ll send someone down to the crawl space later to see what’s wrong down there. But if it’s water-tight, it’ll hold for now.”

A wide circular staircase in the centre took them up to the top level… and an astonishingly beautiful sight. 

The volcanic vent, a seam like an open wound in the rugged and craggy floor of the ocean, glowed red, orange and yellow. Plumes of black sooty ash boiled up from the fissures, swirling clouds in the dark waters. This deep, no sunlight could intrude, even in the deepest blue shadows, but the dim light from the vents lit up the surrounding sea. Colorful anemones and brittle-looking urchins clung to the rocks, and tube worms, anchored to the cliffs, licked out with vivid red tongues into the rich mineral-laden waters. All manner of aquatic life flourished here, from the tiniest motes, to shell-fish, crustaceans, mollusks, squid and octopi both large and small, to fish of all kinds. And, of course, the larval goa’uld, dodging in and out of reach of predators all too eager to feed on them. Something in the nature of the station’s transparent dome resisted the efforts of anything to cling, anchor or attach to it, so their view was unobstructed. 

Tony found himself so distracted by the view that he almost tripped over one of the desiccated bodies lying in the middle of the Control Room floor.

Methos called up a brighter light, then knelt with Henry and Ramirez to examine the three dead. Their bodies were surprisingly intact for having lain there for over two centuries. The stale but sterile air of the platform no doubt resisted normal decay, or insect and animal predation, but still… 

Ronon also drew near, as did Don. 

When Henry tilted one of the heads to the side to get a look at the back of the neck… Ronon growled, low and deep. “Goa’uld. This one was a host.”

So, it soon appeared, were the other two, although the third still had a hole in the back, and a black dried stain on the floor from long-spilled blood. 

Henry commented on the obvious, “They were all hosts, all three. But this parasite left… where is it? I don’t see a dead larva anywhere. There weren’t any other potential hosts available, were there? Why did it leave?”

Rodney backed away to the dome, paling abruptly. “You think it’s still here, on the platform? And why didn’t these host guys leave? This thing has emergency escape pods, correct? Or they could have called for a shuttle, pretended to be their hosts… that’s normal for them. But this… looks like they just… laid down to die.” 

Henry peeled away a scrap of cloth over the one man’s chest… to reveal an odd wound, made of a collection of puncture-like marks, splayed as if made by a hand... He glanced over at his friends. “Wraith. A Wraith fed on this one.”

Ramirez reported from his own study, “These two as well. I imagine the goa’uld left its host because of the feeding. It wouldn’t want to stick around for that. And if there were Wraith here… there was another potential host for it to take.”

Rodney began to look panicky. He had rarely been parted from his sentinel since they bonded, and now was not a good time to discover he only truly felt safe with his mate at his side. Ronon was a formidable warrior, true, but… he wasn’t John. “Wraith? You mean those vampire alien guys who eat us?”

Tony shivered. “Wraith? There was a Wraith on the platform?”

Methos stood up, grim-faced. “Probably still is. They’re near Immortal themselves, able to regenerate from all but the most dire injuries, larger, stronger, faster than most mortal humans… They can hibernate for centuries, waiting for their human herds to re-populate after being culled to near-extinction. And Rodney, don’t knock our swords. It’s the most effective way to kill one of those things, so that it *stays* dead.”

Ramirez nodded his agreement. “There must have been one or more on Atlantis before the Exodus, able to hide out in the power plant platform, waiting for its chance. Can’t have been many, or someone would have noticed a trail of bodies… But this is bad. Very very bad. The Wraith can communicate with each other across vast distances. The soldiers and breeding drones within range of a solar system, but the Queens… they can communicate between stellar systems. We have to find them, and deal with them. Now.”

Amanda stood, pulling her long, surprisingly sharp sword. “I suggest we begin with the rupture in the lowest level crawl space. Sounds like maybe they made themselves a nest down there.”

Ramirez took command, pulling his own awesome weapon. “Rodney, Sam, Methos, stay on point. You have a power plant to get up and running. Henry, you stay and guard their backs. The rest of us will divide into teams, go hunting. You’re right, Amanda, they’re probably on the bottom level, but we don’t want to get blind-sided, so we do this systematically, level by level. All right? Ronon, with me. Connor, Duncan, pair up. Amanda, you take our new shaman and sentinel Eppes.”

Rodney stared at all the biggest, brawniest men preparing to leave. He edged closer to Ronon and protested, “Shouldn’t Ronon be the one to guard our backs?”

Ronon gave a feral grin and tapped his nose. “Sentinel senses. They need me and Don to take point.”

“Well then, what about one of the MacLeod cousins?”

Connor grinned at him. “And miss the chance to kill me some Wraith? Ach, Rodney, you’ll be fine with Henry here. And Methos was known down through the ages as Death for a reason.”

Rodney gave the grinning oldest Immortal an uncertain look. Sam patted his shoulder reassuringly. “At a pinch, I’m a fully trained militiaman myself. Come on, Rodney, we’ve got work to do. Let these guys take care of the Wraith. They’re the experts.”

Methos tapped a monitor console control and a monitor sprang up out of nowhere, focused on the teams preparing to leave. “There you go, McKay. We can watch them from here, and you’ll see for yourself what we can do with a big archaic sword from the Dark Ages.”

Henry sighed, pulling his antique, but well-cared-for and serviceable sword. “Oh, I see. Babysitting duty… Youngest, and therefore low man on the total pole yet again.” His complaints faded into mumbles as the others left the repair team. Still, he stood, braced and ready at the top of the staircase, ready for anything.

Å 

The top level was the Control and Monitoring station, open plan, consoles rising from the floor, maximizing the view outside for some reason known only to the Alterans. Maybe for entertainment value? Because it was certainly that. A little unnerving, too, when a school of electric eels slithered by, chasing goa’uld, and then when everything fled, and a huge dark shape approached, to turn a single eye on the lit-up done. It was either a whale, immense shark or a giant squid, but too large for them to be able to discern an outline shape. And then it was gone, and only slowly did the smaller denizens return. 

The second and middle level was obviously the living quarters. Partitions gave a semblance of privacy for sleeping and bathrooms, with half the level kitchen, dining and relaxation, arranged with couches, chairs and tables, facing the window on the largest of the vents. It was a little heart-breaking, to see the little piles of luggage and bedding, stasis boxes for food supplies, none of it fully unpacked, waiting for the tech crew to put things away. In fact, the only thing they had immediately set up for themselves, was the coffee pot, with a long-dried out and empty carafe awaiting a refill. Luckily, the device seemed to have an automatic shut-off, so nothing had burned. 

And it was eerily silent, here at the bottom of the ocean, the lights still left dim so as not to strain the low-level charge on its batteries, with only the dead on guard.

As the teams slowly moved around, poking into every cubby, cupboard, closet and storage area, through doors and behind curtains, the long sleeping platform began to wake up. The low hum of the engines began to rev up, a breeze whooshed through the ventilators, and the slightest vibration of the turbines turning began to move under the floor.

And then something whispered in the back of Tony’s mind… 

It felt… hungry. No… starving. No again… *ravenous*.

Clicking a comm unit he’d been given, Tony asked his fellow shaman, in a quiet voice, “Rodney? You getting that?”

“What? Getting what?”

“Never mind.”

Blair had told him that one of the benefits of bonding to a sentinel was that it gave a shaman a stronger shield on their mind. Even when not in each other’s presence, no doubt John was too possessive to let anyone else into his shaman’s head. 

Tony opened the comm to everyone. 

“Guys? I’m… I’m sensing, I guess, a hungry and alien mind around here, somewhere close. She’s waking up.”

“She?” several alarmed voices asked.

“Yeah, definitely she.”

“Focus, people,” Ramirez warned. “Clear the platform, by the numbers. We ready to descend to three?”

“Ready,” said Connor.

“Ready,” echoed Amanda.

“Then let’s do this. But stay sharp.”

Å 

In the City databank there had been directions for a game called Dominoes… little black brick-like playing pieces with white dots like dice. One of the ways Atlantis had shown Tony they could be used was by standing them in a series on their ends, so that when you tipped over the first, it would knock the next one down, then the next, and the next… 

Yeah, the next few heated moments were like that. Tony felt them, one by one, coming awake at their Queen’s command. He kept careful count… thirteen in all. 

Yeah, of course they were outnumbered, by fucking near-immortal vampires who were larger, stronger, faster… and who ate you by slamming their hand on your chest and draining the life right out of you. Oh yeah, their Immortal friends had been very clear on that. 

When he stumbled under the weight of yet another waking, make that fourteen, Amanda shoved in on his right side, and Don stepped up on the left to lay a hand on Tony’s shoulder. He shut his eyes tight, trying to block out the vivid, almost overwhelming hunger fourteen telepathic minds were spreading about them like an oil slick on the mental wavelengths. 

Telepathic… yeah. But not empathic, thank the Higher Powers. 

And yeah, it made a difference. At least, it did to him. Because he was a past master at submerging his thoughts, hiding everything that was *Tony* behind thick protective walls. The City had taught him well, how to manipulate and control his own mind. 

The part of him that the Queen was reaching out to, conscious thought and memory, his perception of the reality around him, attempting to fill it with debilitating fear, shadows and nebulous threats, was impervious to her assault. 

When he sensed that Don, and even Amanda to a lesser extent, were both falling victim to the Queen, he reached out with his empathy, his tether of friendship, partnership, reliance and trust, and wrapped them both in it. And they blinked, as if coming out of a daze, and straightened. They met his eyes, one after the other, and nodded. 

He wove a curtain around them, something the Wraith couldn’t see, and made them all but invisible to those glutinous, greedy, starving, disgusting minds. Then he reached out to the other two hunter teams, and covered them as well. Ramirez might have been aware, but he didn’t think the Highlander cousins were… Ronon definitely felt him. That man, once the host to a goa’uld, had learned to wear his own mental armor. 

And then Tony did some reaching of his own, into the heart of the Queen, under her conscious mind, a trail in through her blinding and overpowering hunger.

Whispering as low as possible, Tony informed his teams, “She’s got a ship. A small transport, with a cloak so it wasn’t detected, either by Atlantis or our jumpers. It’s sitting under the bottom of the platform. They carved out a hatch between the ship and the crawl-space… the breech that the platform detected. And… the Queen has a goa’uld.”

He could feel his companions stiffen at that…

“It can’t take control of her. She’s too strong for that, and just as telepathic as they are, if not more. But she kept it, because it… it gives her an oomph. It makes her even stronger, more impervious, faster to regenerate. And it expands her telepathic range ten-fold. Yeah, she kept it. But it’s screaming inside her, outraged… Oh man! It’s not Hathor, but it’s another of the really old goa’uld queens… Niirti. And why are all these sick aliens ruled by Queens, anyway?”

“Any of the others have goa’uld?” Ramirez asked. 

“No… she wouldn’t let them. Didn’t want to give away her advantage.”

“Hunh, figures,” Amanda muttered. 

“But Niirti… she’s why the larvae we’ve seen around the platform are keeping their distance. They hear her screaming and are avoiding it.”

Å 

Quietly as they were able, each team, with their sword-wielding Immortals in the lead, approached the turbine room, where their predator enemy waited for them. Don and Ronon both carried projectile weapons. The sentinels would not, could not, be without something to use in defense, no matter how innocuous or safe-seeming their situations. The problem was, a bad aim or misfire could damage the platform around them, with disastrous results. So, as Methos would no doubt love to brag on Rodney, swords win again. Ronon’s big-ass blaster, like a few in the Atlantis armory, was capable of several levels of ‘stun’, plus ‘kill’ and ‘kill really hard’, and although he had it jacked up all the way, he cautiously holstered it in preference to his short-sword. In this case, he would bow to the expertise of the Immortals. 

As for Don, he was too well trained to miss with his more conventional hand-gun, common in the province militias, or risk damaging this lifeline for the entire Tribe with a bad shot. He would trust his team-mates to kill any he might not be able to get, to prevent any of these monsters getting away to create havoc. The gun had nowhere near the kick of Ronon’s blaster, but if he could make a head-shot on their enemy, it should still do the trick, and in close quarters, he couldn’t miss. They had already been warmed shooting anywhere *but* the head was of no use against the resilient Wraith. 

So only Tony was walking into this unarmed… unless you counted his mind and burgeoning shaman abilities. Tony himself figured, yeah, they counted. Time to get scrappy.

The three teams spread out, took up positions next to the turbines. 

The Queen sent her soldiers up first, keeping her three drone males next to her for protection. The ten soldiers, big, ugly, wearing bone-like masks, were also sexless, spawned in numbers and considered cannon fodder in any fight, no more than pawns to obey the Queen or their drone lords. In desperate situations they could also serve as emergency snacks. Tony sort of sensed that there were a few dried out husks lying in the transport that had already been fed on over the centuries. Trouble was, they were even bigger, stronger, and more damage-resistant than even the drones, although considerably slower. 

The Wraith soldiers spread into ambush position, but didn’t seem able to hear or see their food creeping up on them. It was as if a fog surrounded them, built of a shaman’s influence. 

Once again slipping into those alien minds through their instincts, their hunger, Tony carefully felt around for a switch… and found one. He sent tendrils into one, two, three, four… until he felt too stretched, as if even one more would break his tenuous hold… He’d have to be content with four...

Then he pushed. Hibernate. Sleep. 

Four dropped to the floor. Their six companions stood and stared down at them, unable to comprehend what had just happened… and the Immortals stepped out of the shadows and struck. Ronon slashed one in two before they realized they were being attacked. Don shot another point-blank in the head, and the bone mask shattered, leaving a neat hole behind, dead centre of the forehead. 

Swords quickly slashed the four left standing, cutting away their heads to roll off into corners. They made the same quick work of the four sleepers, so all ten headless bodies would never stand again. 

But now the Queen and her drones were aware of the danger, and erupted up out of their nest to face the outrageous impudence of food, daring to defy them. 

Oh yes, stronger, faster, incredibly so. But Immortals were not so slow off the mark either, with centuries, millennia of training in the art of sword-play. But with one Queen and three drones, it took two or even three on one in order to effectively fight these alien monsters. 

Tony stood back, and tried to pry his way into the drones… it was tougher than the soldiers. These males were older, and their minds were dedicated to their Queen, capable of independent thought in a way the solders weren’t. Tall, long ash-white hair, wearing black coats that looked like leather, but of what creature… they looked the part of lords. The Queen was pale as death, dressed in a long simple sheath dress, long crimson hair and shining eyes... 

Suddenly, she was just… *there*, in front of Tony. 

He backed away, tripped, tumbling down on his backside, to have her kneeling over him, straddling him, staring into his face, hand on his chest to pin him down… fingers flexing, as if feeling him out. And she was using her thoughts like an ice pick, to stab into his head.

He felt the terror of it, of having her on top of him like this… dominating him, raping him with her mind… or trying to. At any moment she would begin to feed… and take whatever she wanted as he wasted away, draining of life. Penetration, piercing him through and through…

And the sudden fury of that, of once again having to play the helpless victim, years and years of subjugation to abhorrent, corrupt minds… it exploded out of him, all at once, and it had a target.

With a gasp she reared back, struggling to control the assault on her mind. 

“Who are you? *What* are you, so strong to withstand us?”

“Really?” he volleyed back, “The Royal ‘Us’? How clichéd is that?”

She tilted her head to one side, still trying to find a way in. But he already had his own path mapped out… 

“You are alone here. Your soldiers are dead, your drones are dead, you’ll be next. You are starving, and you will never feel the pleasure of feeding again. You are already dead, you just don’t know it. All you’ve done, all the long life you’ve lived, at the cost of unnumbered human lives, it’s all over now. You have lost.”

She grinned, horrible rotted spiked teeth filling her mouth. “Perhaps I have, food. But so have you.”

And even as Tony stared up at her, waiting for the incredible pain he knew feeding would be… the spot he was staring at was suddenly empty. The headless trunk toppled forward on top of him, and a gush of hot red blood was spattering everywhere. 

But then, so was a squealing eel-like creature, erupting out of the sliced off neck, rearing up, swiveling it’s beady black eyes around, and seeing Tony lying there, helpless… and squirming its way free, it prepared to leap… only to be grasped in two bloody hands, and torn apart. 

Amanda dropped the two pieces of dead goa’uld on the floor, next to her sword. Then she reached forward and pulled the dead body off him, and offered a hand to help him up. 

“Thank you, Higher Powers. And thank you, Amanda. Two queens dead at once? That’s gotta be a record.”

She grinned herself, a little feral, eyes a little too bright, covered in blood and gore as they all were. But her smile was red lips and perfect even white teeth, and dark, dark eyes that were warm and alive and giving, not taking. 

“You’re welcome, shaman. Any time I can be of assistance.”

Ramirez whooped in the sheer joy of battle, “That was a great fight!”

Tony leaned against a wall to try and get his breath back. “Yeah, and I wish it were over…” 

“It isn’t?” Don demanded, alarmed, looking around and obviously extending his senses beyond the carnage in the turbine room to see what other threats there might be. 

Tony clicked his comm. “Rodney, whatever you’re doing, get down here to the bottom floor, right now.”

“I can’t right now! We’re right in the middle of—“

“Now, Rodney!”

“But why?”

“The Wraith Queen has a transport ship down here, and it’s got a beacon attached. As soon as she died, it started transmitting. It’s giving her exact position, Rodney. She’s calling the whole damn Wraith Swarm.”

Å


	13. Chapter 13: "I suppose they could have chosen a *worse* target..."

Å 

There was a lot of frenetic activity after that. 

Rodney and Sam together soon found the source of the beacon signal and switched it off. With a cursory study of the transport bridge, the two scientists determined the signal had only been operating for the brief minutes after the Queen had died. Hopefully, not long enough to attract anyone’s notice. Since the controls and language of the small ship were Alteran, identical to Atlantis, it was easy enough for them to figure out. And why hadn’t the Queen been sending that deadly message all this long time since Landing, or even during Exodus, since she had obviously been hanging on to the Atlantis undercarriage that long? 

Methos, joining them for a quick look, huffed. “She’s Wraith. They’re greedy, and territorial. They may call other Queens sisters, but they’re really all rivals for the same scarce resources. Us. She wanted to keep it all for herself. All of Novelle, a banquet just for her and her chosen few. Once she gorged herself, she would be able to spawn untold hundreds, even thousands, to serve her.”

The oldest Immortal shut his eyes and concentrated… Tony could feel him, reaching out to the City. “Atlantis. Engage long range scanners. There’s a chance there might be Wraith Hives on the way.” 

Rodney lifted his head from the study of the console he had just shut down. “The entire scanner and sensor array was toast when I was CSO. I had it on my priority repair list, but never got the Officer Elite to sign off on the replacement parts I needed. I doubt Radek would have had better luck after I left…”

A somewhat panicked reply from the City verified that her sensor array was, indeed, inoperable. Her repeated requests for repair had been ignored.

Those with a strong enough Gene to hear her all exchanged glances. 

“Yeah, we need to get those bastards out of there, soonest,” Ramirez sighed.

Rodney brushed off his hands, making an ‘Eww’ face at the slightly slimy residue of Wraith all over everything. “And for that, we need this platform. So, if that’s all? We still have a power plant to get up and running. There’s too much salt scaling on the intake valves, and turbines three and four are clogged with carbon soot, need quite a bit of cleaning, oiling and maintenance before they’ll be ready to run. If you’re through with your Wraith Hunt, can we get some help with that?”

Watching as Rodney huffed up the stairs back to Control, with Sam and Methos following close behind, Don shook his head, glancing at the his team-mates, calmly wiping down their bladed weapons. “The first moment I can, I’m getting me one of those.”

Tony nodded agreement. “You and me both.”

Å 

Meanwhile, now that he was freed from babysitting duty, Henry Morgan, trained as a doctor, serving as a medical examiner in one of the largest cities back on the long-lost home-world, volunteered to deal with the dead. The persistent stench of decay, human, Wraith and goa’uld, were playing havoc with the senses of their two sentinels, and the Immortals weren’t too happy with the carnage either. 

So while their scientists began assembling a long list of maintenance functions required, managed to get a cleaning routine running to help clear the blood off the decks, and the rest collected up bodies and dealt with remains, Henry stepped up as coroner. He grabbed sheets from the living quarters to wrap up the three dead human techs and prepare them for proper burial. Ronon and the MacLeod cousins helped him take them down to the bottom level, where there were several escape pods, designed for emergency evacuation in case the platform failed for some reason. These made handy temporary coffins, with a stasis feature included. One would hold all three techs. Then, with the platform and Wraith transport properly cleared, he made careful count of the remaining bodies, Wraith and Goa’uld. He wrapped the various pieces separately, torsos to be encased on a second escape pod, heads on the third. Just in case. Niirti had also been separated, one half of her with the torsos, the other with the heads. Just in case. These specimens would be of use, preserved for later forensic examination. 

He kept one soldier torso out for his own curiosity. Ronon and Ramirez helped him carry that one up to the living quarters, laying it on the dining table on a sheet, for Henry to begin his study. 

He had grabbed an Atlantis tablet from the top level for the purpose. Two bars about thirty centimeters long, when pulled apart, unfurled a transparent, thin, but rigid surface that became a monitor with touch-activated controls. It would record his dissection and autopsy of the soldier and run elementary scans. Linking easily to Atlantis systems, even at this distance, several database entries came up for him as he worked.

Tony and Amanda found two more of the highly useful tablets, and Rodney, Sam and Methos had each appropriated others for their work. Ramirez and the MacLeods accompanied Sam, Rodney and Methos on repair details, while Don and Ronon contented themselves with doing security watches. Just in case. 

Oh, and Duncan made coffee, from a stash he found in one of the stasis boxes. The first pot had emptied almost immediately, as did the second and third. Four was sitting with half a carafe-full on the warming hob. 

Å 

Don just could not bring himself to be anywhere near the Wraith body. It just stank too much of sheer, unadulterated *wrongness*. But Amanda and Tony watched with fascinated horror as Henry made his examination of the soldier. He kept up a constant verbal report for the laptop recordings as he broke open ribs, cut out one organ after another, identifying it, measuring and weighing, noting how it was, and wasn’t, like a human piece of anatomy. 

“According to these database notes, these Wraith are a hybrid creature. They may have started out human at some point, but their DNA was… contaminated, I guess you would say, with an insect form of life Atlantis identifies as an Iratus Bug. Blue, about thirty centimeters in length, it seems to be… psionic deficient.”

Amanda frowned. “Meaning?”

“It requires the energy of psionic wavelengths in order to survive. It feeds on these wavelengths when it encounters it in other life-forms. And, as near as I can tell, almost every form of life has such wavelengths, imbedded… its ‘life-force’, if you will. But where the Iratus can predate on almost anything living, because the Wraith started out as human, they can only feed from human sources. Unfortunate for us all. The database also says…. Oh hell… the first Wraith were an experiment gone terribly wrong.”

“What?” Tony gasped. “Someone made these things… deliberately?”

“So it would seem. By the Alterans, or their Atlantean offspring. 

“The Iratus Bug is an insect life-form, next to immortal, since they feed directly on life-force. A queen spawns drones for breeding, soldiers for going out and collecting ‘food’ which she and her drones can then suck out of them, and a rare replacement queen that she sends out with a swarm of her own. They regenerate indefinitely, unless suffering catastrophic physical damage, or with their feeding apparatus removed. They can spawn in unlimited numbers, and hibernate in times of food scarcity. Their communication is by pheromones spread from their Queens. 

“It seems the Lanteans were attempting an experiment in immortality for themselves. Maybe they saw the drawing out of life-force as a way to Ascend. Or maybe they were attempting to acquire the apparent immortality of a Wraith without the side-effects. Who knows? Either way, it wasn’t just ill-advised, but when they discovered they couldn’t control their creations and allowed them to escape, it became downright catastrophic. Not to mention insane. Using the feeding of a Wraith to achieve Ascendancy? Not possible. Just not possible.”

“Hunh,” Tony stated with an affronted frown. “So we were stuck as food for these things because the Alterans couldn’t be bothered to clean up their own damn mess?”

“I think that is exactly the case here. Or maybe couldn’t. The Wraith must have out-reproduced them… maybe outnumbered them by millions to one, by the end.”

Tony could feel it from everyone listening in on comms… the horror, anger and betrayal each of them felt. 

Then there was a scratching noise that attracted their attention to the table… 

One hand Henry Morgan had removed was using clutching and flexing fingers to attempt to crawl off the table. 

With one swift motion, Henry took a cleaver and slammed it down on the thing, pinning it firmly in place.

Å 

Once Methos, Rodney and Sam had identified the repairs and maintenance required, the three engineers dragooned all hands into assisting with the work. Clangs, bangs, wrenches clashing with stubborn rusted or corroded bits and pieces, forcing valves open to be scraped, some refitted from stores of replacement parts, scans for metal fatigue and weaknesses, review and a few abortive trial runs… The Wraith transport they left where it was. The breach was sealed, after all, every circuit, crystal and element switched off and dead. Study of the vehicle could tell them much they would need to know, like how its shields had so completely confounded the Atlantis scanners. 

They worked flat out for days. Luckily, the ventilation, desalinization and oxygenation systems and other life support functions were all perfectly in order. The bodies, three human, fourteen Wraith and one goa’uld queen, were all carefully packaged and placed in the three stasis holding pods, loaded on Jumper Six for transport back to Cascade. Gradually, the air even cleared out the decay smell, and the reek of Wraith. That was something neither Don nor Ronon would ever forget. And now they had samples to send out as a warning to other sentinels. 

Tony grew thoughtful as he and Ronon stood at the dome in the Control center and watched as the goa’uld larvae schools grew by thousands, and swam closer and closer to the platform. 

“Niirti was screaming, inside the Wraith. She was absolutely terrified of being held prisoner inside another, unable to gain control. Ironic for a goa’uld… but I think they all heard her, and kept their distance.”

Ronon slowly nodded. “Yes… that would be the worst possible fate for a goa’uld… experiencing for themselves exactly what their hosts would feel.”

Tony frowned some more. “So now that she’s not… emoting any more, they’re venturing to approach… Atlantis, machine or not, can communicate on telepathic wavelengths. Maybe empathic ones too, since she always seemed to know when I was afraid, unhappy… I wonder…”

He approached one of the consoles, and pulled up a monitor. The platform had full local scans, after all. They had been running in passive mode, using as little power as available in stand-by… 

Rodney ventured closer, ever-curious. “What are you up to?”

“Do you recognize any of these energy readings? Are any of them telepathic, on the order of the goa’uld?”

Rodney studied the various colorful threads of frequency showing up on the monitor. Some of them were echoes of whales and other sea creatures calling over the ocean currents. Some were random geological vibrations from the vent fissures, radiating heat, friction, minor earth tremors. 

“The red lines… by the Powers… you’re right. Those are telepathic transmissions. The green and blue… the ones that only became active on this time span? Those have to be Wraith, and probably you, while you were communicating with her. But the little red squiggles, the ones that have been active all along, are definitely goa’uld. The Wraith Queen might have been hibernating, but even so, she controlled the parasite, and Niirti wasn’t asleep, not for a moment.”

Tony shivered. “If it was possible to feel sympathy for a goa’uld…”

Ronon grunted. “Which it’s not.”

“No. But, Rodney, can we duplicate that frequency? Broadcast it?”

Rodney blinked. “You mean… like… a goa’uld repellant? Powers! If we could do that…”

Sam Carter, having heard every word, said, “On it. We have the facilities to broadcast, wide-band… let me… there.”

And even as they all stared out the transparent dome at the surrounding sea, they saw all the nearer goa’uld turn tail and bolt in swirls of bubbles, as if for their very lives.

Ronon laughed aloud and slapped Tony’s back, almost sending the shaman to the floor. “Good one, Tony!”

A viable defense against the goa’uld had just been found.

Now all they had to do was find something as effective against the Wraith. And Tony was very afraid that he knew just the thing. After all, the Wraith Queen had demanded, “Who are you? *What* are you, so strong to withstand us?”

Yeah. He suspected that whatever made a shaman able to connect to others empathically might be just the psionic wavelength the Wraith were attracted to… and unable to create for themselves. And, certainly, only a shaman would be strong and adept enough to fight one off.

“Um… Rodney? You might want to put a pin in those other wavelengths, too. The green and blue ones. We may have need of them…”

Å 

Sam and Rodney, building an anti-goa’uld box from scavenged parts, were loathe to leave the power station platform, having a new toy to play with. But then Jack recalled his Guardian team tech to return, and was sending Jumper Two (or SG-1, as Jack insisted the SGC Jumper be called) to pick her up. 

Methos and Henry were staying behind on the platform. Methos was needed to complete repairs and maintenance, then he would be the one to take the separate plug-in unit, ready to connect it to Atlantis, when they were given the word. For that, he would need a jumper, and a pilot, as that delicate and dangerous operation required two people. Until then, he would man the platform and monitor functions. 

Ramirez and the MacLeod cousins were bored to tears now there was just routine maintenance work to be done. They asked if SG-1 could take them back to Cascade, so Jumper Six could be left behind for Methos, with Henry, of course, its designated pilot. 

As for Rodney, he was beginning to get a bit antsy without his sentinel within his sight. No doubt John Sheppard was becoming equally antsy, as his whiney complaints of “Aren’t you done *yet*?” were arriving over the communications network with increasing frequency. And if all those big, brawny, sword-wielding Neanderthals were going to just leave… He felt himself beginning to panic. 

Methos, sitting near, leaned back in the Control room chair, and laughed aloud. “Aww, Rodney! You *li-ike* us! You *re-eally* like us. I knew we were growing on you.” 

Rodney bristled, defensively, “No, I don’t… I just got used to having a bunch of big brawny guys with swords to watch my… Oh, leave me alone!”

“Come on, Rodney,” Ronon recommended. “We’ve done enough damage here. Sheppard’s just a day out from Athos, and we can meet him there. Besides. Don’t you want to show off your brand new goa’uld repellant?”

Amanda wanted to stay with Tony and Don, who would be going with Rodney and Ronon on Jumper One to rendezvous with Sheppard aboard the *Puddle Jumper*.

So, as one group after another left the platform, Methos leaned back in the control chair and blew out a huff of relief, albeit tinged with regret.

He commented to the air, “I knew he liked us, really…” Then he winked at Henry and with a sly smirk added, “Alone at last. I thought they would never leave.”

Shaking his head, Henry could only laugh.

Å 

In the long Exodus from the lost home world, and the general Diaspora after Landing, there were still a few original cultures that managed to remain intact, not unlike the Magicals. They retained more of the past than most, in languages, belief structures and religious rites, histories and legends of their past… After the Enviros had crammed too many divergent and conflicting peoples together for generations, they were only too relieved to spread out. Most of these groups gravitated to communities of their own. If large enough not to risk in-breeding, they decided to keep themselves separate, to maintain and rebuild their cultures from oral traditions. Some collected on the mainland, like the Highlanders in the uplands of Cascade, or the Jaffa of Stargate Commune spreading up certain river valleys. Skandia clans had chosen to settle in along the fjord-ragged coast north of Seacouver Sound in Cascade, beyond the range of the goa’uld, to pursue a sea-faring life-style. 

But more often, these tightly-knit insular conclaves chose islands in the Carib Chain of Smuggler’s Reach. The West and East Carib Seas ranged to either side of the straits that separated the north and south continents and held archipelagoes of islands, few of them habitable. Many of these were the tops of submerged mountains, or volcanic atolls and plugs that raised them high above the water line even at the highest tides. Many boasted truly impressive vertical cliffs of dolomite columns, a hundred meters high or more. This made them practically goa’uld proof, not to mention giving them high ground for cover in bad weather, against hurricane winds and storm surge tidal waves. When looking for new settlement locations, such islands were specifically chosen for fresh water sources, and, on their lea-sides, sheltered bays and coves with natural break-waters, where even a fleet of fishing boats could sit out any storm. 

Spread across the equatorial waters, the weather was, by and large, more benign, warm year round with ocean breezes to cool them in high summer. Even storm and hurricane seasons were survivable, with plans in place for moving to storage bunkers and shelters, cave networks carved out of the rocky heights. On some islands, the buildings were temporary, tents or grass and palm-leaf huts, easily and simply pulled down, packed, and re-built when necessary. The wharves, piers and break-waters were built of stone, resistant to high winds and storm surges, as well as goa’uld incursions. 

Athos was the most populous of the Carib Island communities, and because of its location, in Morrigan’s Sea south-west of Cascade, the most strategic as well. But many others were almost as large: Nipon, Ch’in and India were heavily populated. There were countless smaller islands and smaller populations dotting the great Ocean. 

The *Puddle Jumper* knew them all. But Athos was their home-port. 

In a deep, sheltered glen outside the main town of Port Ath, was the hidden hanger where Jumper One was normally berthed, a naquadah generator waiting to recharge, when needed. The main hanger also housed Rodney’s lab and workshop. Various lean-tos nearby, shrouded with netting stuck with palm fronds and cedar branches, hid the completed Jumper Seven, ready for assignment, and the more derelict shuttles Rodney and John had discovered and collected, waiting for the scientist and engineer to do what he could to refurbish, repair and maintain them. Jumper Eight, in slightly better condition, was sitting hidden outside Cheyenne at the SGC, for Sam to fix. All of Rodney’s little domain was further hidden by a small cloaking and shield device also plugged into the generator.

Flying back from the power plant platform, Rodney had found the *Puddle Jumper* just rounding the southern cape of Athos. He buzzed them, dropping the cloak for just a moment, laughing at the waving hands from the deck, then re-cloaked and made for the Jumper hanger. He gave Tony, Don and Amanda a tour of his little empire, before leading them over the rise, to see the port town below, Port Ath, and the sailing ship just rounding the point and heading for the main harbor and their fixed berth. Ronon had left them to go straight down to the port, to greet his Captain, and assist in the off-loading of cargo.

“Most of the storms come in on the west,” Rodney explained the features of their island. “The headlands up behind us shelter us from the worst of it. And this being the east side of the island, we rarely see much damage to the town, even in the worst hurricane. That’s why Athos has more permanent buildings than most Carib Chain communities. And notice, we’re a lot higher up than Rainier... helps us avoid goa’uld hostings, of course, but mainly, it’s because it keeps us above storm surges and tidal waves. When we flew over, you saw the lakes and marshes in the center of the island? It’s like a bowl… high on the outside, low in the middle. Fresh water springs feed into the lakes. Those marshes are incredibly rich loam soil, grows anything. We get three, four harvests a year of vegetables and fruits. Makes us almost self-sufficient on the food front, which a lot of Carib islands aren’t. Not much arable pasture land, though, so we do need to trade for meat and textiles, not to mention anything mineral, metal or wood. Not enough suitable trees for forestry to work… we’d denude the whole island in pretty short order if we tried, and it’s a balancing act to maintain tree cover while still supplying firewood and chips for smoking. Stone for building we quarry ourselves.”

The permanent stone buildings of Port Ath were constructed in a sort of ring around a large central plaza paved with smooth, flat stones. There was a semi-permanent market, with kiosks and stalls, set up to display a dizzying array of merchandise and produce. Not that there were supposed to be free markets outside Atlantis, of course, but even the Lanteans allowed for distribution points for Elper communities. If there were any Coast Guard visits, many of the tent-like shops could be immediately closed and hidden away. 

Amanda, Rodney, Don and Tony took their time wandering through the plaza, stopping to examine the goods on offer, and chat with the shopkeepers. From the many different styles of ships at harbor, it was evident they had chosen a good time to visit. It was evident the visitors were expecting a new shipment of goods from the *Puddle Jumper*. Everyone knew they would have been invited to the Lantean Inauguration, and would have taken advantage of the opportunity for trade.

Don and Rodney immediately arrowed toward a blacksmith vendor… his offerings including a selection of long-knives, short-swords and their longer brothers. Most came with leather scabbards built to fit and attach to belts or back harnesses. Amanda offered advice on the best choices and lengths, and tested the various blades for balance and bite.

Tony was a little hesitant at first, moving through such large crowds of people. The population of the island was only about half that of either Cheyenne or Rainier, but it still seemed like a lot to him. Even his exposure in Cheyenne, with Daniel keeping strangers at bay, or Rainier, where so many were sentinels, guides and shamans like himself, it hadn’t seemed as… *busy* as here on Athos. So many different *kinds* of people, too… hair and skin color, different clothing styles, different manners and accents… all so unfamiliar to him. 

He shifted in behind his companions, as if it would hide him… but occasionally, someone would take notice of him anyway… he had to assume it was as much because he was here with Rodney, who was getting a lot of greetings from the locals… those who mostly had honey-coloured skin and red-brown hair, like shaman Teyla Emmagan, as well as a tendency to her almond shaped eyes. A lot of them were half-Magical, too. 

Amanda grabbed his arm and towed him to one clothing vendor, pointing out some sheeny silky green cloth that she insisted would look great on him… really bring out the colour of his eyes.

“Oh yes,” agreed the young woman behind the counter, pulling a few pieces of ready-made clothing out for him to look at. He glanced shyly at her, and she smiled. She really was very attractive, with pale skin, shining black hair twisted into a braid and pinned on top of her head with gold-colored combs. Her black eyes were slanted, and she batted her eyelashes at him, red lips curved in invitation… He couldn’t help but smile back.

“Try this on, and see if you like it,” she invited.

He didn’t hesitate to pull off his shirt, and Amanda helped him into the green silk tunic. 

“Oh yes,” purred the young woman, daring to caress a hand down his sleeve. “It’s perfect for you. Would go nicely with a pair of black leather pants, or even black leggings.”

“Ooh, good idea!” Amanda quickly agreed, paying for the tunic, grabbing the discarded shirt to shove at Don, and dragging Tony to a leather-worker’s booth down the passage a little. 

Leaning over her counter, the young woman called out, “Come back when you can! I have more items you can try on for me!”

Tony gave her a little wave as he found himself at another stall with another beautiful young woman giving him admiring glances. In fact, he was catching a lot of those sly smiles, from men and women. And as he relaxed a little, he found himself rather enjoying the attention. So when the girl at the leather shop offered to get on her knees to measure his inseam… He was rather shocked at himself when he grinned at her and widened his stance to give her room. 

Amanda almost choked on her reaction. Rodney merely sighed and shook his head. He confided privately to the Immortal, “It’s John Sheppard all over again. They all try to catch his attention, too, and he *never* sees it coming. Athos isn’t quite as apt to ask for DNA contributions from strangers, to widen the gene pool… I had to put three islands on our ‘not if it was the last harbor on Novelle’ list in the past year, just because they were a little too… aggressive with him. One bloody island actually tried to kidnap him!”

Amanda’s eyes were alight, considering this. “Yeah… I can see it… but best not mention that to Tony. Considering his history, I doubt he’d take it well.”

“No, I bet he wouldn’t, since that’s what his damn sperm donor was doing to him…”

They meandered through the market, Tony growing more and more at ease with the friendly and speculative smiles he was getting. He could almost feel himself warming, opening up. His shoulders lifted, his whole body seemed to loosen up, as if released from bondage. There were so *many* attractive people here... pretty girls were *everywhere* he looked. And they all seemed to like what they saw in him... After so many, many years of hiding, forgotten, ignored, invisible to all... it was... invigorating to get a little positive attention.

One person who was not taking this well, however, was Don, who was beginning to glower. 

Tony caught the eye of yet another pretty girl, and slowed to a stop. He smiled wide at her pretty blushes and said, “And what do you have on offer, miss?” 

She giggled at him, and waved a hand over a few piles of finely-woven brocades in floral patterns. He gave the girl more of a look than the merchandise, but he turned half to Amanda… who was paying, after all, since he had no money and nothing to offer in trade. “What do you think of a vest to go with this shirt? I like this one in particular,” and he winked at the shop girl.

Don huffed, and grumbled, “Why don’t you just offer to strip naked for her, like you did with the Ch’in woman back there? Offer to give her a baby, and she’d empty the stall for you.”

The shop-girl gasped in surprise and abruptly backed away, behind an older relative who glared at them all until they went away. 

But that was nothing to Tony’s shock and dismay. He abruptly shut down, closed off like a clam snapping tight in its shell, shoulders hunched, head down, face a blank mask, just like the one he wore on the City. And keeping himself as far from the crowds as possible, he headed straight for the harbor. 

Rodney growled at the abrupt change. “Nice one, sentinel,” he griped at Don. “The guy is still having nightmares from being a sexual toy and sperm delivery system for years, and you go and jam your whole boot in your mouth... probably put his recovery back by months. I was kind of enjoying flirty Tony.”

Don sighed and rubbed his forehead, already deeply regretting his hasty words. Yeah, he had to admit, he had been kind of enjoying the looser, happier Tony too… until he totally spoiled the light-hearted mood. He was only too aware that he had absolutely no right to question Tony’s behavior. Worse, he might have done serious damage to the new shaman’s fragile ego. He had just been starting to relax with people, and…

Rodney hurried after Tony, not much of a one for shopping trips anyway, but Amanda lingered to regard Don seriously. 

“You know you totally screwed up there, right?”

“Oh yeah.”

“I know you’re feeling territorial with him, but…”

“I have no right. I know.”

“Mm. Maybe. Maybe not. But you need to rein it in, for sure. He’s still healing, and that’s not going to happen in a day, a ten-day, or even a month. You need to be patient, and very careful.”

Don nodded, totally agreeing with her. “How do I fix what I just said?”

Amanda shrugged. “I’d give him a bit of space, first. But, you know... maybe this wasn’t the worst thing. He’s been in denial to this point, not so much dealing with his past as ignoring it, shoving it in a box he only hopes he can just forget. Which is not going to work. What he really needs to do is take all that pain and rage inside him and let it out, vent it like a release valve, or like clearing out clogged turbines. Then maybe he can let it go. Maybe you just made him confront all the feelings he’s suppressing. If he gets mad and calls you on it… that would be the best thing. Then you grovel. If he shuts down totally, or worse, takes it to heart and lets it eat at him… then you’ve got worse trouble than I think, and we may need to get Teyla to intervene.”

“Not the other shamans?”

“In this case? No. If Blair were here, he’d be the one to call, but Teyla can handle it. It’s a mother thing, Don.”

“A mother thing?” he ventured, doubtful. 

“Yeah. Rodney and Spencer don’t have the right background, Luna and especially Willow don’t have the maturity… no, Teyla is the best option. But… from the look of the way his spine is stiffening and his strides are getting longer and faster, he’s building up a head of steam. And that… that’s a good thing. So prepare to take your lumps and be suitably sincere and repentant. Right?”

“Gotcha. Sincere and repentant coming up.”

Å 

Tony lost no time rounding on Don when he caught up. It was busy down on the docks around the *Puddle Jumper* pier, so no one was paying much attention to them as Tony whirled around, grabbed Don’s shirt, and dragged him behind a pile of crates. 

“You had no right to call me out like that!” he exclaimed. 

“No. You’re absolutely right. I didn’t.” 

“I wasn’t doing anything wrong!”

“No, you weren’t. I know that.”

“All I was doing was talking to a pretty girl. I was just being friendly. I’ve never… there was never… I’m still learning how to even *do* that! But I *know* I wasn’t going over any lines! And I sure as hell wasn’t offering anything more than a smile, maybe a purchase of a bit of clothing!” 

Tony was almost breathless, his face beet red, as he ranted on. 

“All I wanted to do was talk to her! How many people do you think I’ve ever just… talked to, in my life? Until I emerged, it was one! Just one! And she’s a bloody machine! So I think I’m entitled to widen my network of people I can be friendly with, don’t you? How *dare* you even suggest I would… that I would volunteer for… You think any of that was my choice? That I wanted my father to keep selling me to the highest bidder, over and over? That I invited *any* of it? That I *enjoyed* it? Any of it? Those brief fumbles in a darkened room with women who wouldn’t even speak to me, never looked at me? Or worse, when Gibbs… when he…”

The young man was gasping now, leaning over, and Don surged forward to catch him as he wobbled, caught between nausea and great, raking sobs. 

“No,” Don whispered in his ear, holding him tight, rubbing a hand up and down his trembling spine. “No, I don’t think that. I’m sorry, Tony. I’m sorry. I had no right to say what I did. No right, and no call, because it wasn’t even true. You have every right to be furious with me, with your dad, with Gibbs… with all of them. Let it out, Tony. Let it out, man. That’s it…”

Don was aware of a worried coyote pacing around the two of them, making worried little yips, brushing against Tony’s legs. 

Slowly, the sobs eased off. Don grabbed a bit of rag hanging from a nearby bale, and cleaned Tony’s wet cheeks… and his own. The new shaman hiccupped a bit, then took the offered rag and blew his nose. 

“Thanks,” he mumbled, before leaning down to pat his spirit animal. “But I’m still mad at you.”

“Yeah, and you should be. I really, really regret what I said. None of it was true, and I had no right.”

“You embarrassed that poor girl, you know… you embarrassed me, and you made her father, or big brother, whoever he was, really mad. I could feel wisps of that before I had to get out of there, away from you.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I could smell it. I’m usually more cool-headed than that. I’m sorry.”

“Tell it to that girl.”

“I will. I’ll go back and apologize. I apologize to you, too, by the way.”

Tony gave him a sour and suspicious look.

Don put up his hands in supplication. “No, really. I… I guess I was feeling jealous. You’ve pretty much been all mine since we landed in Rainier, and… I got used to thinking of you as mine. And it wasn’t right. I have no hold on you, and you have no obligations to me. And you weren’t the one acting outrageously and unacceptably, that was all me. You were fine with the flirting. Nothing out of line there at all. I was wrong in what I said, and how I behaved. I promise to not do it again. Please, Tony. I know I have no right to ask it of you, but… forgive me. Please?”

Tony eyed him dubiously for a moment, then huffed out and nodded. “Okay. Just don’t do it again.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

“Okay then. But you really do have to apologize to that girl and her family.”

“Yeah. I’ll go do that right now. And I’ll order you that brocade vest you want at the same time, okay?”

“A bribe?”

“No. A peace offering, and earnest of my better intentions.”

“Okay then.”

Å 

They had completed the off-loading of the *Puddle Jumper* and dealt with several merchants who had come into Port Ath harbor just to arrange exchange of goods, to load Sheppard’s ship with more cargo, bound for other shores. 

Spotters had alerted them all to the small trail of goa’uld that had followed them in from the open ocean. Rodney showed off his new device to the growing crowd of Athosian town officials and Council members. With just the flick of a switch… every one of the little eel-like parasites had turned tail and fled out of sight and range. 

Rodney explained how he (okay, he *and* Sam Carter… okay, *and* from an idea from Tony) had come up with the device, why it worked, and dealt with the unwelcome revelation that there really was such a thing as a Wraith, and potentially a greater danger than even the goa’uld… 

It was a long day.

Å 

The Guardian Team had permanent lodgings in the Militia Headquarters on the main plaza of Port Ath. There were guest rooms where their visiting Alphas, Amanda, Don and Tony were all settled for the night. The plan was for them to disembark at first light to continue their journey. They had a few delivery stops to make on the way, to other Smuggler’s Reach islands: Cimmeria, Ch’in, maybe Abydos, if they got clearance, when the town of Nagada was expecting a sand-storm any day that would effectively shut them down for a ten-day at the minimum. The next port of call would be LA, and Port Hollywood. 

But it was still full dark outside when there came urgent knocking at all their doors, and the request to meet in the conference and planning center on the ground floor of the Militia HQ. 

They had expected an early wake-up call, but not this early.

Halling, one of the Athosian Councillors, was already there to greet them, with militia techs setting up the communications centre. 

“We’ve just had word from Cheyenne,” Halling announced. “O’Neill is calling the militias to be ready. He wants to speak with you, John, and Rodney. Apparently, there’s been an assault on Abydos. He says it’s the Lanteans.”

Rodney frowned heavily. Abydos was one of the smallest Carib populations, only a couple thousand people, spread across the third-largest land-mass on the planet. While nominally within the jurisdiction of Smuggler’s Reach, they had a special tie to the SGC. Their Chief Elder’s daughter, Sha’re, had been married to Dr. Daniel Jackson, before he emerged as a shaman. Jackson had led a defense of the island against a goa’uld hosting, during which his wife had been lost. But he still considered the Abydons as his family, and they still revered and loved him in return.

Daniel was pretty much guaranteed to take any attack on Abydos as a personal affront. 

Rodney sighed. “Well. I suppose they could have chosen a *worse* target…”

Å


	14. Chapter 14: Yes, Leon concluded, the world was his oyster now.

Å 

Don asked, “Are you sure it’s the Lanteans attacking them? Not a goa’uld attack? If one of them got into a Lantean with a strong enough gene to fly a jumper…” He hoped the answer was a goa’uld hosting, although this level of mobilization seemed unusual, if all the militias were being called into readiness. But if it was a hosting, they had Rodney’s broadcast device to test out. He, for one, was curious to see what effect the broadcast goa’uld scream might have on a hosted goa’uld.

Halling shook his head. “O’Neill says Abydos is under attack by the Lanteans. He was very specific. But you should talk to him yourselves. He is waiting. Our comms are open to Cheyenne. Come to the Council Chambers.”

Captain John Sheppard, Alpha Sentinel of Smuggler’s Reach, led the way. If the damn Lanteans were attacking an island in *his* domain... there would be hell to pay.

Å 

The communication system set up in the comms room of the Port Ath Militia HQ was Atlantis tech, retrofitted and expanded by Rodney. Although they had outfitted a room they felt was big enough for most conferences, this was an extraordinary situation, and the space was pretty crowded. 

John and Rodney, with their Guardian Team members Teyla and Ronon, were of course present. But because of the events around the Inauguration, there were also other Guardian Team alphas represented: Spencer and Hotch for Pastureland, Harry and Luna for Hogwarts, Buffy and Willow for Hellmouth. Amanda, Don and Tony were also taking places, in the background by the wall. 

In small boxes tiled along the bottom of the main display monitor were tie-ins to other militias. The circuit to Rainier showed Jim and Blair, and Guardian Team members from Cascade Megan Connor and Simon Banks. The Hellmouth line displayed the angry faces of Xander Harris and Rupert Giles. The window titled ‘Hogwarts’ held the visages or Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Pastureland was represented by Penelope Garcia and Derek Morgan. A window for LA showed councilors Alan Eppes, Hetty Lange and Owen Granger, as well as two of their sentinel militia team leads, Ian Edgerton and G Callen.

Rodney took the control console and expanded the monitor window to show the Cheyenne transmission in the center, at near life-size. And all those cramming in for the conference blinked at the unexpected faces staring back at them.

Front and center was Jack O’Neill, with Dr Daniel Jackson pacing angrily behind him, looking seriously pissed. In fact, no one had seen the mild-mannered academic quite so furious before. But clustered around the two Stargate alphas were the rest of their Guardian Team, Sam Carter and Master Teal’c of Chulak, assorted councilors, and… well, a lot of people who *should* have been on Atlantis. 

Dr. Radek Zelenka, their Chief Science Officer, Dr. Miko Kusanagi, Dr. Amita Ramanujan, were all there, peering over O’Neill’s shoulder. And most talking over one another as soon as they caught sight of the group gathered in the Port Ath conference room.

O’Neill put two fingers in his mouth to whistle, loud and jarring, bringing them all to silence. “Acht! One at a time! Yeah, we got a bunch of visitors here in Cheyenne in the past hour. Seems Leon Vance got tired of waiting for his exalted Captain to prepare for an orderly evacuation of the City. He and his new best buddies, Eli David and Jethro Gibbs, have decided to make their own break. They used Dr. Reid’s evacuation plan, as updated by Dr. Zelenka, and with just a few extra bells and whistles, to pack up and leave Atlantis. 

“Now, Zelenka and these guys here were ready for something like this, and as soon as they were given command of a shuttle of their own, and had dealt with any SFs guarding them, they came straight to us. But it seems a few of them got lost on the way… probably didn’t get the best of their watch-dogs. That’s our guess, anyway. 

“But here’s the thing. That nice cozy island Reid had all picked out for the new Lantean colony? Not good enough for our overlords. They wanted something a little more move-in ready. They made straight for Abydos. We tried to make contact with Kasuf earlier, with no luck. Either the Lanteans have already taken control, or they’re jamming comms. It’s still a couple hours or so before dawn, their time, and Daniel says they were expecting a sandstorm to hit sometime around dawn today. Once that baby socks in, there’ll be no getting in or out, for a ten-day or more. With the better part of an hour lead on us, the Lanteans will have already taken over what they could. The Abydons have no way to deal with an invasion force… of Lanteans, for crying out loud! So now we need a plan, boys and girls, because I am *not* letting this stand.”

“You and me both, O’Neill,” John declared. He nodded to Rodney to try and make contact with the Abydon Council. 

Rodney shook his head at his sentinel. Jack was right, either the comms were jammed, or the Lanteans were in charge and not accepting calls. “How many shuttles did you bring with you, Radek?”

“We have twenty two. But our people are not warriors, Rodney. This was the first time most of them had ever even been in a shuttle… I doubt any of us would be effective in any kind of armed conflict.”

“Well, lucky thing we may have a few… um… extra gene carriers wandering around who might be able to help,” O’Neill confessed cautiously. 

Blair piped up at this point, “I know we’ve got more immediate concerns, but we should also be considering that Atlantis is out there, practically deserted right now. We might want to send some folks over there to check out the City…?” He glanced over his shoulder at three men behind him with huge honking swords who were giving big feral grins. “I think our new friends the MacLeod cousins and Mr. Ramirez would be willing to take up that assignment.”

“Aye, we would at that,” Duncan MacLeod agreed, folding heavily-muscled arms across his chest. “All we need is a seneschal to get us there.”

O’Neill nodded. “Well, we seem to have an embarrassment of riches in that department. I’ll get one unloaded and cleared and send it your way post haste. Now, about our other issue...”

But before they could go further with plans, Amita pushed forward and addressed the LA group. “Mr. Epps, Don, one of our missing shuttles was piloted by Charlie. He most certainly would not have deserted us without being under threat. Dr. Mallard and Dr. Beckett are also missing. They were so looking forward to returning to the Cascade Highlands…”

O’Neill nodded. “So, more hostages for the bad guys. But that’s not our most urgent problem. First we need to do a recon of the situation on Abydos and how bad it is… At our count, they have thirty one shuttles for their assault and a thousand armed SFs. Now, if they followed Reid’s loading lists, they won’t have all the back-up weapons or ammunition they expect, but they will have their troops, and each of them will have a personal weapon. So we need to check and see how far they’ve got, and what they’ve done with the Abydons. Then we’ll see what we can do to teach those Lantean mutherfuckers a thing or two…”

Å 

The Lantean Shuttle 1 drifted over the island of Abydos in a search pattern, while waiting for the rest of their fleet to join them. It was still hours before dawn at this longitude, the perfect time for an invasion, when the locals would still be asleep, or slow to move. 

Their evacuation ‘drill’ had been tight and efficient and accomplished in around six hours. Now all they needed to do was assess their potential opposition and determine a plan for neutralizing them as swiftly and efficiently as possible. Plan A was to use their culling technology to sweep up everyone on the ground into a buffer and dump them on Alpha Island to sink or swim as best they could. But first they needed a catalogue of where everyone was. The total population of Abydos was somewhere around two thousand, almost all of them untrained and unarmed civilians. Which, along with the established and fortified town and rich naquadah resources, made Abydos an attractive target. It meant housing and infrastructure would be pretty much what they would need to settle in their own people, with a little bit of bunching up. Better yet, with a thousand armed and trained troops at their disposal, they had more than enough fire-power to take the one town on the island. 

Heat-sensors logged the few small groups of humans and mastages dotted across the vast deserts, most of them close to rocky outcrops, or moving steadily, if slowly, toward them. A collection of people were also located at the main naquadah mine in the north-east corner of the island, deep in the rampart mountain ranges, where there was a semi-permanent encampment built into the caverns and mine shafts, for protection. A closer look showed a caravan ready to form, to bring a shipment of the precious ore back to the processing plant at Nagada. The miners and mastage drivers would return to the main town and spend a few ten-days off-time there before returning to their work, with supplies of food, water, fresh beasts, and necessary replacement parts or tools. 

As for Leon, there were a couple of problems posed for his Plan A, that would make it difficult to accomplish. For one, Kavanagh, his pet geek and the only one he was willing to trust right now, reported that he could not distinguish between human and animal life signs. Sweeping up large numbers of the heavy, bulky mastages was… problematic. A Culling Buffer might have a large capacity, but it wasn’t infinite, and they only had a couple empty ones left after packing up as much as they could from the City. Kavanagh also reported that he was finding that the high concentration of naquadah in sand, stone, buildings and air, was making their scanning equipment somewhat unreliable. He wasn’t sure the culling beams would work through the rock. But with relatively small groups isolated in pockets, and days travel away by mastage, Vance decided they could be left for now, to be dealt with later.

Luckily, everyone else on the sparsely-populated island was holed up in the one permanent, fortified town of Nagada, and most of the local mastages were penned in their barn, outside the town walls. 

The island’s one major river, the Nile, began in Lake Aswan, fed by springs forced up in the central mountains to the north, escaping to trail down to the lowest corner of the island, in the south-west. The river valley carved into the sands and soil, then ran over bedrock until it spilled into an extensive river delta, with natural channels cut through a maze of low-lying mangrove swamps. The main town had been built on top of the foundation of a rocky promontory, then extended down to surround two of the main channels of the unraveling river mouth, two excavated channels to the sea dug deep into the silt-laden delta to form a harbor. 

High stone walls circled the town, with heavily protected gates on the south and north to enter and leave, the watercourses flowing through them covered by grills, not just against goa’uld incursions, but also the Nile crocodiles, that tended to be rather cranky. What little farming was possible on Abydos was on the river flood plain north of the town, somewhat protected by the headland of their promontory. Annual flooding dropped silt-rich deposits perfect for crops of rice and wheat. Forage for their mastage herds was grown in irrigated fields in the upper Nile, miles north of the town.

Leon counted just over a thousand souls down there. They’d got lucky with their timing, not just that most were asleep, this long before dawn, but also with so many positioned out at the mines on the opposite end of the island mass, days travel from their target. Easy pickings. Leon made a note to himself, to have someone deal with the stragglers and collect the shipment after they were well-ensconced in their new home.

Leon tapped pilot Dorneget’s shoulder. “Find us a sheltered, hidden place to land the fleet, about a mile east, outside the town. It’s all sand dunes out there, we’re all cloaked, we can assemble our forces in the dark and they’ll never notice us until it’s too late. We use one cloaked shuttle to land in the town, a small advance unit to secure the Gate Tower on the north wall. The rest of us can use the cover of dark to cross the bridges and get our main force in place, ready to enter once the gate is down. Look for a dip in the dunes big enough for all fifty three shuttles and an assembly space for the troops. We don’t want the locals to get any warning of our arrival. Will only create panic. And start a communication jam. We know a lot of these Smuggler’s Reach bastards have managed to score communications devices, or they wouldn’t be so successful hiding from our coast guard patrols.”

He then signaled to Gibbs to begin the roll call for their fleet.

And that was the first of the nasty shocks in store for the Lantean Invasion Force. 

“What do you mean there’s only thirty shuttles reporting!” Gibbs demanded of his second, Stan Burley. 

The second could only sigh. “Shuttle 47 reports that their pilot, Dr. Charlie Eppes, tried to zat him and alter the flight plan. That shuttle was the one carrying most of our generators. Chief Warrant Officer Makepeace was on that one too. He managed to get the drop on Eppes before the damn Gene-Orphan could reprogram navigation. Actually, Shuttles 45 through 51 all encountered… resistance, from their pilots. Seven shuttles, with Gene Orphans on the stick. So I think we can guess what’s happened to all the rest of the missing shuttles… just checking… yeah. All the missing were piloted by Gene Orphans. They’ve gone AWOL, sir. Shuttle 51 reports the pilot tried to enter coordinates for Cheyenne in Stargate Commune. I’d guess that’s where they were all going.”

While the rest of the crew and passengers of Shuttle 1 expressed… um… *dissatisfaction* with this state of affairs, Leon had to hand it to Radek. The man might be disloyal to his Lantean overlords, but he wasn’t stupid, by any stretch. He had foreseen an opportunity, and taken full advantage of it. Not unlike Leon himself. 

“All right! Settle down, everyone. What’s done is done. This might be a minor setback…”

“Minor setback!” Eli protested. “That’s twenty-two shuttles in Elper hands, ready to come at us any time they like!”

“And we still have the advantage, with thirty-one. And our pilots are trained for battle conditions. Gibbs, check what that leaves us in the way of personnel and ordnance. The Shield dome? The generators? Weapons and explosives? Do we still have them?”

Gibbs reviewed the lists… and his scowl grew. “We’ve got our troops, and the Lantean-born civilians… most of the generators, thank god, they were on the shuttle with Makepeace… But all the heavy weaponry is on the missing shuttles. As well as almost every Gene Orphan and most of the first gens. So the only significant ATA genes we’ve got left are the pilots, and we can’t trust those seven who tried to bolt after Zelenka. Food supplies seem to be equally divided. We do have the extra shield generator. It was on Ducky’s shuttle.” 

And, yeah, that bit hard, that his old friend Ducky was one of those who tried to escape back to his birth-place. It felt like a personal betrayal of the worst kind.

“So the whole armory, weapons, ammunition, replacements, back-ups, explosives, the zats and stunners and blasters…”

“Zelenka kept those with him. Our only weapons are the personal arms our SFs will have on them.”

It was hard, very hard, not to swear a blue streak at this point. 

“Yes, yes, annoying, but still not a deal breaker. Do we have enough people and fire-power to take the island? Why, yes, we do. We also have enough supplies to stand off any threat the Elpers might mount. If really pressed, we can always take a hundred guys and fly back to Atlantis, fire up the FS for one last time for resupply of ammunition and explosives. Or we can bloody well learn to make our own. We’ll have to eventually, anyway. And remember, the only Elper pilots are a bunch of science geeks who wouldn’t know one end of a rifle from another. You think they’ll have the guts to fire on us? Not a chance. We establish our beach-head, relocate the Abydons, all of them, and the Elpers will just have to accept it as a done deal. Right? We’ll also have a virtual monopoly on the naquadah trade. They need that stuff just as much, or more, than we do. Sure, there are a few deposits at Hellmouth, other places, but nothing like the high grade from the Abydon mines, plus the largest and best processing plant.

“Well, gentlemen? Are we still going to do this, or not?”

Eli frowned heavily, then shrugged. “We have little choice, at this point.”

Leon smirked. “That’s the spirit. So let’s find our landing spot, decant our troops and get organized. Commander Gibbs? I yield command to you for this operation.”

With a determined grunt, Gibbs leaned over to address the fleet, hovering just above them and awaiting orders to land. Once his troops were assembled and briefed, they would get a spare Culling Buffer from Shuttle 10, and begin the sweep of the town from there. 

Å 

Abydon Council Elder Kasuf was roused from a heavy sleep by his son Skarra. 

“Father. Wake up. We have a problem.”

Kasuf quickly struggled to get his bearings, accepting a cup of coffee from his son. They’d been expecting a sand storm to arrive almost any day, causing the caravan at the mines to delay their start by a ten-day, to be on the safe side. Getting caught mid-way to Nagada, in open desert, in such conditions, was dangerous. But sand storms were a fact of life, hardly an emergency calling for him to be pulled out of bed well before dawn had lit up the eastern horizon, or the storm was about to arrive.

“What is it, my son? The mastages alerted us? The storm is come early?”

“No father, worse. I’ve called for Evac. The alarms should ring out shortly.”

That got Kasuf’s attention. And a quick hustle to climb into his robes. “Goa’uld attack?”

“No, father. The Lanteans.”

Kasuf blinked. “What? Lanteans?” 

“The mastages woke us… they smelled something strange, wrong, something that didn’t belong, and kicked up a hairy fit. I sent out our sentinels, and they just reported. There’s maybe thirty shuttles landing in the east desert outside town.”

Kasuf blinked again, unable to understand… “But… that must be almost all of them! Why are they here? Even if they’re seeking refuge from the City for some reason, we can’t hope to feed and house so many without preparation, and with the storm…”

Skarra gave him a dark look. “No, father. I don’t think they come as guests. They are unloading their SFs first. All thousand of them, near as we can tell. All armed.”

Kasuf was appalled. This… this was… he had no words, flummoxed by the news. They all knew there were power problems on Atlantis, and the Lanteans would need to relocate at some point soon, but… an armed invasion? This had never, ever, happened before! Not on Novelle, not without the enemy having snakes in their heads.

Skarra continued, “I thought it best to call for Daniel’s Evac plan immediately. We’re getting everyone to the catacombs as quickly as possible. Luckily, we’ve had much practice, and everyone was already anticipating the storm, so…”

Just then the warning bells rang out all over town, usually reserved for sand-storm alerts or goa’uld incursions, but it would wake everyone and get them moving. The extensive tunnel systems dug under the town had long been their emergency protection against all kinds of threats, from bad storms (and sand-storms were often violent enough to strip the flesh from bones in mere minutes), flood-season, or goa’uld incursions. They didn’t get many hosting attacks over the sand bars and coral reefs outside the Nile delta, or swimming the dangerous gauntlet through sharks and crocs in the mangrove channels, but those hosts the parasites did claim, usually the river crocodiles, could be dangerous all on their own, and had occasionally flooded the town to devastating effect. By now, taking shelter was second nature to all of them, and accomplished quickly and without much fuss. Stocks of food and water were always kept in reserve, enough to support everyone for a ten-day, or more with careful rationing. The heavy concentration of naquadah made communications difficult from down there, though, so they had to send out an alert to their Alpha Guardians beforehand.

“You sent our alert out?” Kasuf checked with his son, picking up his ready-packed satchel of essentials by the door. Then they hustled into the streets of the town to join the exodus down into the tunnels. 

“I tried, but to no avail. There’s some kind of unusual interference. It might be the coming storm, but… I think it is the Lanteans. Luckily, the mines, the hunters, fishermen, and the herders outside range have already found suitable shelters to ride out the coming storms. We can only hope they will await our word to come home.”

For the small fishing fleet, suitable shelter meant finding safe anchorage at the nearby island of Cimmeria. Elder Gairwyn would take good care of them there. For the hunters and herders, there were plentiful cave systems in every rocky crag, some even with hidden springs and pools for water. Several mountainous areas provided protected arroyos and canyons for their herds, many stocked with bales of forage and water for their mastages. 

As for the main herd, the headland west of the river flood plain held a vast cavern that had been fitted up as shelter, with pens, stables, silos and training rings. Pipes from underground springs provided a constant water supply. Most of their animals had been driven into the stables last evening, in anticipation of the dawn storms, and Skarra had ordered the rest into the barns once he became aware of the invasion. 

Kasuf nodded, satisfied. That was as much as they could do, until they found out what kind of havoc the Lanteans’ arrival might mean for them. An unprecedented action of this magnitude would catch everyone’s attention, no matter how tightly they tried to control communications. They could trust in their Guardian Alpha to deal with the Lanteans, and both Kasuf and Skarra knew Dan’yel would move heaven and earth for their sakes.

“Very well. Let us gather our people and get them to shelter, then. Sheppard and Dan’yel were already apprised of the coming storms and might not be aware of why we have not been in contact for some days… we can only hope they’ve noticed what the Lanteans are up to.”

“Yes, father. Of course, Dan’yel would say that it would serve the Lanteans right if they were caught out in our sand-storm.”

Kasuf chuckled at the mild tone of acid in his son’s voice… and knew he had caught that from his good-son. He could only agree with the sentiment.

Once everyone was accounted for and lodged in the deep catacombs, the metal doors were locked and barred, the shield provided by their Alpha Shaman McKay was turned on, and the townsfolk were safe. 

Å 

“What do you mean they’ve disappeared?” Gibbs barked out. “Over a thousand people just don’t disappear into thin air!”

“I’m sorry, sir!” Dorneget’s squeaky voice came over the comm. He had been left in Shuttle 1, to keep up the scans, pin-point any Abydons and warn of any incoming shuttles. In fact, he was the only one left outside the town walls, in their make-shift landing field, with just the one SF to guard his back, SFD Trainee Jasper Miller. With an Atlantis Shield Dome over the field and the town, he shouldn’t need more than that. Kavanagh had already adjusted it to accept only their own thirty one shuttles in or out. “But… they’re no longer showing on scans! No people at all anywhere within ten miles of us. All I’ve got is those elephant-camel things of theirs, in the cavern pen west of the town. But… the naquadah plays hell with our scanners, sir, and Nagada is supposed to have underground tunnels, so I suppose… And… now the life signs at the mine have disappeared, too! They have caves there, right? As well as mine shafts? The other few dots… they’re falling off the scan too…”

“They’ve taken shelter,” Gibbs guessed, huffing in annoyance. This invasion of theirs was not going according to plan… first the defection of the Gene Orphans, which at least left them with their Security Forces. Now the Abydons had gone missing… when they should have been able to scoop them all up in a spare Culling Buffer and ship them off to the Alpha Site. 

But maybe it was for the best that they were out from underfoot, for the time being. If they were hiding in tunnels and caves, it should be easy enough to lock the Nagadans in, make sure they stayed there, until the Lanteans could establish their presence in the town. 

They had thought they’d have days before the Elpers even realized what they had done, and more days still until their trained militias arrived by ship, to try and re-take the town, and good luck coming by stealth with only one harbor on the entire island. But if they now had the shuttles the Gene Orphans had stolen… that shortened the timetable by a lot. But then… even if they scraped up all the militiamen they had, armed them as much as possible, how many could they possibly load onto their twenty-two shuttles? That gave them, at conservative estimate, maybe two hundred soldiers, compared to the Lantean SFs, numbering around a thousand, barricaded behind the Nagada town walls, not to mention an Atlantis shield, and with a near-unlimited supply of naquadah to fuel it. 

No contest.

When the Abydons got tired of hiding, or were starved out, whichever, then they would be hostages to get the Elpers to back off. They’d have to let the Lanteans have their new island domain, in exchange for the release of a bunch of miners and nomad savages. 

But Leon had advised, and Gibbs was forced to agree, that it was a little too early in the campaign to let out their own civilians from the Culling Buffers. Just the thought of all the chaos that would entail, explaining the situation, getting everyone settled down… it made Gibbs shudder in horror. That could wait until they were well and truly at home. 

In the meantime, Gibbs had troops lining the town walls, and organized roving patrols to check out the town. Clear it of any stragglers, booby-traps, or items of value they might want to take advantage of. Chief among those would be any weapons, and where the food and water and naquadah stores could be found. They’d secure the silos and naquadah processing plant as a matter of priority. Oh, and find the tunnel entrance, so it could be properly secured and guarded. No sense letting the locals get the drop on them from inside their perimeter lines.

Since these activities only called for a small portion of their troops, the rest were sent to set up billets in the Nagada militia barracks, against the north wall. And since they needed even more space for their numbers, even if they traded off billets in shifts, they’d take over any other free accommodations they could find nearby. 

Once his orders were given and being carried out, Gibbs climbed the stairs to the town walls. There were sentry towers built on each of the four corners of the town. The two on the south side watched the harbor and delta channels, both topped with lighthouse beacons for navigating the access channels. The two on the north wall watched the Nile valley, the routes from the desert and the bridges over the three main river channels… two that flowed into the town, and one that diverted just to the east. There was also a taller Gate Tower, directly over the main entrance gate into the town. The Lantean Command set up their post in that Gate Tower. A wide balustrade ran all along the top of the stone fortifications, accessible from the stairs inside each of the towers. He soon found Vance, David and his daughter, with the two Intel Officers, Rivkin and Cruz, lurking back in the shadows. A sour-looking Chief Warrant Officer Robert Makepeace was also there. But then, that guy always looked sour, like a pole had been stuck up his ass. 

Gibbs looked to the east, where the first hints of dawn were just beginning to stain the horizon. To the south, a straight line of dark ocean was outlined against the vanishing stars above. It was still too dark to make out the details of the town or the mangrove jungle beyond the south wall, but scans had told them there were no ships docked at present, neither for cargo delivery nor any of the fishing fleet. That seemed odd… but no matter. Fewer potential complications. He took a deep breath of the night-cooled air. As soon as the sun rose, the air would begin to heat to uncomfortable levels, becoming extra oppressive with the humidity from the swampy delta. 

For the amount they had already accomplished in their operation, Gibbs was (more or less) satisfied. He had already heard over comms that Pacci had located the big metal doors to the underground bunkers, barred and locked from the inside, although no sound could be heard within. Gibbs had ordered them to drop the bars on the outside too, and post a guard. 

He gave a brief, terse even, sit-rep to Vance, Makepeace and David.

“So. We’re in control, then?” David demanded. 

Gibbs shrugged. “For now, we are . I’d wait till we see what kind of counter-measures the Elpers have in store before breaking out the celebration party.”

Leon nodded, and Makepeace grudgingly agreed. 

“So we leave our people in storage until we’re sure we have a stranglehold on Abydos?” the Chief Warrant Officer wanted verification.

Gibbs shuddered. “Best not have a bunch of scientists and civilians underfoot if there’s going to be any fighting, not to mention kids crying and getting loose. And if we don’t need to unpack right away, we don’t need a bunch of crossed brooms either.”

“Fair enough,” Leon grinned. “We can certainly give it a few days before we let people loose. I want a plan in place by then, gentlemen, and assigned billets for everyone. So while your people survey the town to clear it of anything… untoward, Gibbs, get some of them to check out the living quarters and main storage areas. Robert, you prioritize who should get which sections and buildings, and who will need to camp out for the short term. We can probably use the Nagada tunnels if we have to, once they’re cleared out. And everything else can probably wait. Now. Robert, Gibbs, what can we expect from the Elper militias? You don’t think their geek pilots are much of a threat, but their militias are trained and armed, and they’ve got sentinels.”

Gibbs took a look around. The Shield they had been able to throw up also covered the dale between dunes where their shuttle fleet was currently sitting. Since the Atlantis domes were programmed to allow her shuttles to pass uncontested, they’d had to get their one *dependable* geek, a Lantean-born named Dr Peter Kavanagh, to adjust for lockdown, so only pre-approved shuttles would be allowed through. 

“I think we’re pretty well dug in here. It’ll be a classic siege maneuver. And we’ve got the best defenses. They can hurl themselves at it all they want, and we’ll be sitting cozy. I might worry about McKay, Zelenka, maybe Reid… those guys are bright enough to pull something we may not be able to counter… might find a way through our shield… but we still have the advantage of numbers, and we’ll have home-court advantage, too. Close Quarters Battle in the streets? They’ll run out of ammo before we do. I suggest we also survey for defensive positions, sniper nests and prepare for barricades in the streets.”

Even Makepeace had to nod in acknowledgement. He was still disgruntled over not being made a part of the conspiracy from the first. To find out about it at the last minute, when it was already a done-deal… that was a bit of a come-down for him. To go from unofficial second in command of the military, to ranking somewhere behind that loose cannon Gibbs? Sure, he could see that Leon might not have trusted him to know the details beforehand, but… well. Even he didn’t know how he might have responded before the plan was actually in action. 

“Got one more question for you, Gibbs. We got seven known traitors in our midst, who were ready to go AWOL with the shuttles, if we hadn’t stopped them. What’s being done with them?”

Again, Gibbs winced, thinking about Ducky. “For now, containment. We found a room out in the mastage pens with a door and a bar closure. I’ve got guards on them. When we flush out the Abydons from hiding and collect the outliers, we’ll make them all part of the hostage exchange. Give ‘em all back to the Elpers.” 

Makepeace pressed his lips together. “That’s all? Just… give ‘em back? Give ‘em what they want? They’re damn traitors!”

Gibbs gave him a smug look. “Did you miss the part where I said they were in the mastage pens? Those damn animals *stink*, Robert. That should be enough revenge for anybody.”

Leon chuckled, then raised an eyebrow and took out a toothpick for chewing. “I’d be careful, there, Robert. Technically, we’re all traitors right now. To a City that will soon be sinking into the sea, and a bunch of corrupt, greedy morons who refused to see the writing on the wall. Once Atlantis is history, the Gene will be largely irrelevant to everyone. I’ve had Dr. Kavanagh working on an override to the shuttle controls, to bypass the gene requirement. He says he’s close. With a workable control bypass, we won’t need the gene for anything. So I don’t begrudge a few Gene Orphans from returning to their damn Elper roots. Not like we’ll need them anymore.”

David senior scowled at that. “Not even to… how shall I put this… do the work none of the rest of us wish to do?”

Leon leaned on the balustrade and shrugged. “That’s what we’ve got the Maintenance and Service Division for. It’s always been a catch-all for people not bright or talented enough to serve in other areas. Don’t worry, Eli. It’ll all work out. We can always ‘hire’ in Elper workers from elsewhere, once we’ve regained formalized relations with the Elpers.”

“And how is that supposed to work?” Gibbs asked, somewhat mystified. “No City, no high-tech, no Genes, no Charter… As of now, we’re just another settlement, albeit one with shuttles. What other leverage do we have?” 

Leon gave a Cheshire Cat smile. “That’s what we’ve got high-grade naquadah for.”

Å 

Seven extremely demoralized people sat in the tack room of the Nagada mastage cavern, reflecting on their past mistakes. Oh, not the decision to make a bid for freedom, never that… but at being too slow, too awkward, too reluctant, maybe, to be as ruthless as they should have been. Each one had been prepared, or thought they had, to make their move to neutralize their SF babysitters and take control of their shuttles. And all seven had failed, from one reason or another. 

For Dr. Charlie Eppes, it had been the unexpected addition of another trained soldier at his back… Chief Warrant Officer Robert Makepeace. While Charlie had been wrestling with the one SF, Makepeace had grabbed the zat and shot them both. That had left their shuttle hanging in mid air, until Charlie had revived enough to take back the controls. But under Makepeace’s un-holstered hand-gun, and the very real threat of a crippling shot to his shoulder, elbow or knee joint that would not impair his ability to fly, Charlie had no other choice but to capitulate. 

But while Charlie’s Shuttle 47 had stopped dead without an active pilot at the helm, two other shuttles, with less-than-expert pilots, had banged straight into it, dislodging those inside just enough for the temporarily restrained SFs to escape and retake command. And so Drs Rachel Cranston and Donald ‘Ducky’ Mallard had both been forced to comply as well. 

Meanwhile, Dr. Carson Beckett, who, in spite of his extremely strong ATA, had never been comfortable with it, had panicked at the shuttle controls, wobbling all over in an effort to avoid crashing into other shuttles, and over-correcting madly. Of course, the more he tried to avoid hitting others, the less effective his efforts were. He hit at least two in his erratic path. As a result, he was too distracted to be aware that his tied up SF had not only woke up from the zat, but wriggled out of the inexpertly tied ropes. 

It was just the kind of luck Dr. Beckett had come to expect, that neither of his victims had been SF craft with only Lanteans at the stick, but two of his own. And so Science Officer Dr. Sebastian Lund, and Ops Analyst Patton P. ‘Triple P’ Plame had also lost their bids to escape with Zelenka’s fleet. That was a particularly bitter pill for Beckett to swallow, when he knew how those two men longed to return to their Smuggler’s Reach home on the island of Norlens. 

The seventh failed pilot was Ops Analyst Michelle Lee, a little mouse of a woman originally from the Smuggler’s Reach island of Ch’in. She just hadn’t been able to work up the nerve to shoot anyone, even with the zat. But her attempt, waving the silver weapon all over, had given her SF guard more than enough opportunity to disarm her. 

They were being kept together. In a dark, rustic, rough-hewn room of wooden slats and barn-like atmosphere, that absolutely *reeked* of large smelly animal. On the walls hung an assortment of leather tack, from saddles, harnesses, reins and halters, to feed bags (for very *large* heads). Shelves all along one wall were crowded with boxes and bottles of labeled potions, bandages, compresses, first aid kits, for treating any sick animals. Then there were the peg-boards where hung all kinds of odd purpose-made tools for mysterious functions. They could make a guess at what the brushes and combs were for… 

“You know, though,” Patton ‘Triple P’ Plame offered, “It isn’t really so bad in here. They left us water and snacks… and I gotta say… the barnyard smell does kinda remind me of home.”

“They’ll let us go when they get what they want, right?” Sebastian prompted hopefully. 

“Of course my boy,” Ducky answered quickly. “They’ll have no use for us in their new domicile. Without the City, the Gene is virtually useless. And although Abydos can probably provide them with all the fuel they could ever require for their generators, it is severely lacking in creature comforts, or even a sufficiency of foodstuffs. They’ll need to deal with the Elpers at some point. And I have no doubt the Guardian Alphas will insist that we be allowed our freedom. *Every* Gene Orphan should be allowed to leave, and go wherever they wish. I will insist upon it.”

“Except…” Michelle Lee ventured. Mouse she may be, but she was also an analyst trained in military planning, and not exactly a dummy. “Except that their major bargaining chip is the shuttles. With generators to recharge them, sure, but they need pilots. And that’s us. Or, Gene carriers with an ATA-C or above. They’ve only got twenty four Lantean-born with even an ATA-C. If Dr. Zelenka and the others made it through to Cheyenne, then the Elpers already have twenty two shuttles they can recharge, all with pilots. That’s not much of a numerical advantage.”

Dr. Rachel Cranston sighed and patted Michelle’s arm. “I’m sure it’ll all work out. Luckily, for now, we don’t have to worry about Atlantis tipping into the sea and drowning us all. And yesterday, I have to say that was *my* biggest concern. So... what did we have on our shuttles that we lost to the Lanteans?”

Ducky sighed. “I was carrying a shield generator. So Leon will have some protection when the Alpha Guardians come for us.”

Charlie reported, “And I had the naquadah generators.”

“I got the database records and backups,” Trip declared. 

“Food and some of the explosives, plus some equipment from the green houses,” Sebastian recited. 

Michelle said, “Just food and extra uniforms on mine.”

Carson said, “Mine was loaded down with everything in the medical bays that could be detached and moved, including our stockpile of drugs.”

Rachel nodded, “And I was carrying all the Culling Buffers we had left that held home-world native life.” Then she double-checked, “Anyone have any of our people? The civilians and families?” She got shaking heads in return. “Well, that’s a relief, anyway.”

Charlie groaned. “Look guys, I am just *soo* sorry about this… I’m the reason two of you didn’t make it out in time.”

“As to that, laddie,” Carson admitted glumly, “I’m as much at fault as you. I apologize most abjectly, Sebastian, Patton. You could both be landing in Norlens right now, if not for me.”

Rachel clucked her tongue and said, “All right, you two, enough with the recriminations. We are not going to play the blame game on my watch. Now. This does not strike me as a high-security lock-up, even with the two guards posted just outside the door. And I see any number of iron and steel tools up on the wall suitable for taking this door off its hinges. Since our captors didn’t even bother to tie us up, I think we should be making plans to escape.”

Charlie, Trip and Sebastian all perked up at that. Ducky and Carson were more than willing to hear out their colleague, a psychologist of some talent, who had been longing to return to her family in LA.

But Michelle was still in depressive mood. “And go where?”

“I don’t know if you noticed, Michelle, but we’re outside the town fortifications of Nagada. That’s obviously a sanitation feature, to keep the mastage environment as separate from the homes of people as possible. But it’s an advantage for us, because we can sneak out and get to the shuttles on the other side of the town. I say we take them and get the hell out of here under our own steam.”

Now even Michelle began to look more positive. 

“And the guards?”

“Seven to two. I like our odds.”

Å 

There was an old, old saying among the humans of Novelle, “It’s always darkest before the dawn.” 

In the considered opinion of Team Lead Stan Burley, it was also the creepiest. 

The abandoned town of Nagada, mostly constructed of stone and baked-clay brick buildings three and four stories tall, crammed together on narrow streets just barely wide enough for mastage-pulled carts to pass through, echoed with ghosts. The wind whistled through, growing stronger and louder by the moment, around corners and into alleyways, whipping up small tornadoes of sand. 

Nagada was rare as one of the few settled communities that made use of canals inside their walls. Once the Nile River reached lowlands, it meandered and unraveled like an end of spun yarn, depositing rich loads of silt in an ever-growing delta marsh-land of brackish tidal flats that fed the mangrove forests. The countless channels out beyond the town walls held enough natural protection from the goa’uld larvae in mud flats, hungry sharks and crocodiles, along with the added features of grills against the water gates and locks at the town walls. Most of the town’s taller and heavier buildings were built upstream on the bedrock of their promontory on the west half of town, stone foundations built up to residential buildings and streets. Industrial, commercial and community buildings were also settled on stone foundations laboriously laid over the marshier terrain. 

Two branches of the Nile, dug into deep canal channels, trisected the town, draining from north to south, filled with brackish water, and carved into many additional waterways through town. They were obviously designed for barges, towed by mastages on the parallel streets. Locks and pumps raised and lowered the water levels, to control flooding, assist cargo delivery, and flushed them so they didn’t go stagnant. The seaward ends to the south had grates, grills and metal doors to keep out any goa’uld larvae. All along their lengths were bridges for crossing, some placed from second and third stories of opposing buildings, some arched high enough to allow clearance for barges and mastages, and some with swing or lift-gates to get them out of the way at need. 

The constant sloshing of water and the occasional *plop* and dripping was unnerving to anyone not used to the constant low background noise. To Stan, long-time veteran of many battles against the goa’uld hosting seasons, the very thought of all that water with sea access, no matter how barricaded, just made his flesh crawl. He could hope that, as they took up their permanent residence here, he, and his men, got used to all that open water so close to every street. He could see from their jerky and nervous motions that his men felt as antsy as he did. So that haunted feeling of being watched didn’t help. Not when the ever-mounting wind added to the random noises that kept them all on high-alert.

Gibbs had sent several squads to begin the searches, section by section, and grid by grid, to clear the town. They started at the north end and made their way gradually down toward the lower market plaza, naquadah-processing works and harbor walls. Orders were to clear, secure, inventory anything useful found, and then identify best guard positions for sniper nests and barricades. Then a full unit was to take over the processing plant. Fully third of their forces were going to be engaged in pacing the walls, setting up and entrenching in the streets as first shift, with the other two thirds on stand down at the north-wall barracks and billets, waiting for their turns at these duty posts.

Since the Nagadans must all have been asleep when the alert came, there were no half-eaten meals left out in the buildings they searched, or candle flames to be snuffed. Even in the bedrooms, with beds unmade, it seemed most must have had some kind of ready-to-go bags packed by the doors. Stan wondered if they’d had some kind of advance warning of the invasion… 

As his team completed their current street check, he met up with Chris Pacci and Rick Balboa and their teams at the wide open market square by the harbor wall. The stone-paved plaza was bordered by imposing civic buildings, and by the water-filled canals on two sides, high-arched bridges allowing passage, again with enough clearance for the barges and mastages. There was a clear view from there of both light-house beacons, high enough to peer over buildings into the canal-streets, or over the break-water wall into the harbor outside. Colonnades fronted the official buildings on the market plaza: Council Hall, court, bank, guild and trade offices, hospital, school… all empty, dark and haunted. The all-important naquadah processing plant was to the east of the square, with direct access to the main canal. 

The three Team Leads compared notes, even as they, and their team-mates, nervously kept watch, twitching and jumping at every unidentified sound.

“Find anyone?”

“Not a soul.”

“You think they were ready for us?”

Pacci shook his head. “Not us. They got a drill in place for goa’uld hostings and sand-storms. My guess is they’re expecting one or the other.” 

“Goa’uld?” Balboa echoed, alarmed, glancing edgily at the nearest canal. “You think there’s a hosting coming? That’d be damn poor timing!”

Pacci shook his head. “Naw. This time of year, at this latitude? More likely to be a violent storm. I’ve heard about Abydon storms. They can get pretty nasty. Even the goa’uld avoid this whole island in the late summer and fall.”

“And us?”

Pacci shrugged. “We got the shuttles. Our sentries will tell us if there’s trouble coming. We’ll be fine. Just need some warning to get to cover.”

A sudden noise from the shadowy alley next to the Council Hall made them all start. There was the crash of something knocked over, then a high-pitched squeal… They all whirled instantly to face the threat, weapons raised…

…until a large orange cat sauntered nonchalantly out of the dark, with just the naked tail of something hanging from his blood-dotted mouth. He sat, opened his mouth to lick up the last of his prey, sharp fangs gleaming white and stained red. He stared at the three squads of men and, showing what he thought of them, rested back, lifted a hind leg, and began licking his butt. 

Laughing nervously as they all came down from high alert, the Team Leads checked their maps, pointed out the next streets to check in their sections, and got their teams moving again. 

Once they were gone, the orange tom got up, stretched, and decided to go on with his hunting. At the entrance to the alley, he paused to go and tangle around the ankles hidden there in shadow. He purred as a hand lowered to stroke his head, smooth down his arching back, and scritch at his ears. 

It was always pleasant to spend time in the aura of a shaman as strong as this one.

Å 

Leon Vance remained on the town wall as the rest of his accomplices scurried about on their various tasks. He listened in on his comms as his security forces made their rounds. They were almost done clearing the town and establishing their defensive posts. He smiled into the south, where the ocean begin to sparkle with white-crested waves. It made a beautiful picture, gold light banishing the shadows and glinting off the canals, buildings of white and grey stone, or terracotta red brick, with balconies, elegant columns and graceful bridges filling the town… It would be a good place to live, almost as wondrous as the soaring towers of Atlantis.

He neglected to check on the eastern horizon, over the empty-seeming desert, where a smudge of thick black cloud was hovering low and threatening, but still barely visible in the dawn light. Even if he had noted, he wouldn’t recognize what it meant, or the danger it represented. Because, even with the shield, the needle sharp shards of naquadah in the sands could lance through any force-shield without the necessary low-kinetic settings programmed in. 

But, for now, Leon looked out over the world, and it seemed to him it lay at his feet. Yes, Leon concluded, the world was his oyster now. 

Å


	15. Chapter 15: It wouldn't take long before the situation turned very ugly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Patton P. ‘Triple P’ Plame (a character in *‘NCIS: New Orleans’*) is confined to a wheel-chair in the series, but I thought it unlikely he would be in this universe with advanced medical facilities, so made him injured (temporarily) instead. My AU, my rules.

Å 

Charlie felt it was unfortunate, *really* unfortunate, that none of the seven of them had any fighting skills whatsoever. Even his fiancé, Amita, had taken some self-defense courses… Charlie had always been too busy and too uninterested to take the time. Not to mention Michelle was so tiny, Ducky a tad on the elderly side, and Trip had suffered an injury when his shuttle had been knocked into by Carson, that left him limping badly and needed a hastily-adapted broom-handle as a cane. 

It seemed odd that the one with the most training was the gentle Dr. Carson Beckett. He explained this was as a result of his shaman training at the Rainier Sanctuary. If Blair didn’t insist, Ellison certainly did, that anyone liable to be required to face the goa’uld be fully trained to take care of themselves. Not that he had kept up on any of those skills since… But, Carson assured them all shame-faced, he’d learned his lesson and would be suitably cut-throat in his efforts to get them all out of this mess. Charlie, Rachel and Sebastian were equally determined. 

But, as it turned out, ruthlessness had not actually been called for. 

From out of nowhere came the electric blue *zing* of a zat blast, glittering through the wooden slats in the tack room door… and then several thuds, as their guards all fell in a heap, just as the seven prisoners were preparing to open their door… now without the locking hardware or hinges they had carefully and quietly unscrewed from the frame. As they heard footsteps approach, they hurled down the door and prepared to battle… 

… Dr. Daniel Jackson, who grinned at them and put a finger to his lips, to warn them into silence. Looking around, he beckoned them out. As they huddled close, he whispered out the briefest of explanations. 

“For those of you who don’t know, I’m Daniel Jackson. Yes, *that* Daniel Jackson. I lived here on Abydos for a year… I know every secret way in and out of this place. Come on guys. I’ll get you back to the jumpers, and you can get the hell out. Head back for Cheyenne as originally planned. Right?”

Michelle, quiet timid Michelle, piped up suddenly, “We take the same shuttles we flew before, right?”

Daniel shrugged. “Sure. Why not? We still need to get that stuff out of Lantean hands, right?” 

Ducky shook his head sadly, “Mine held the shield generator, already unloaded, I’m afraid.”

“Not to worry. McKay’s on it. And he says your shuttles were never keyed to be kept out of the shield, so you’re good to go. And we’ve got to go *now*! We can catch up at a better time.” 

Dr. Daniel Jackson, Alpha Shaman, archeologist, one-time Lantean, was armed to the teeth and led them hastily out of the mastage cavern and into the darkness of the pre-dawn morning. He did, indeed, know the way well enough to tread in the dark and shadows, over the rocky headland, then past the town wall and sentry towers, over the un-watched bridges over the Nile to the east-side desert, in and around identical dunes, until he used a hand-signal to slow them all down. They crept around a corner into a vale where the shuttles were all parked. Most had been landed with military precision in regimented rows, ten across, until it came to the last seven, all rather haphazardly placed. Only one shuttle, in the middle of the front row, had a lowered gangway and lighted interior spilling around on the level sands.

Daniel hustled them around to the back row, well out of sight and distant from the one manned shuttle. 

“Okay, you guys know where to go from here?”

They all nodded, Michelle hurrying to take her designated craft, Shuttle 50, like it was an old friend. None of them stopped to consider that oddity… the other six hurried in her wake, however, and had no problems getting the hatches to open for them. Daniel remained on the ground, watching to guard their escape. 

He had rather expected the landed fleet to be guarded, somehow, with sentries walking a perimeter, as Jack had warned him. The one manned jumper, lit from within and humming with engaged engines, should have been scanning for any sign of an incursion… to hold Lantean SFs on guard… walking perimeters, protecting their one sure asset, protection and emergency getaway plan… the manned jumper should have been scanning them and alerted whoever it was that there were life-signs on approach, or even heat signatures, sneaking up on them. Unless they simply assumed, in their Lantean arrogance, that everyone moving was one of theirs, and didn’t bother to check on their comms? Whatever. Their mistake. It wasn’t like anyone on Novelle had any experience at this sort of action. The Lanteans probably could have used a dry run or two.

His little group of lambs were already powering up their own jumpers for lift-off when one lonely guard appeared in silhouette on the top of the one lowered ramp and shouted out, “Who’s there? You guys got authorization to be here from Commander Gibbs?”

Even as six of the jumpers took off and sped through the dome on their way to freedom, there was only a howl of terror from the interior of the guard jumper. Distantly, Daniel heard, “Stop them! Stop them, they’re taking off!”

“But Gibbs said to guard your back…”

“And he’s gonna kill us both for letting those guys get away! Stop them! And watch out, there’s one loose guy on the ground out there, and one shuttle powered up but stuck on the ground…”

The incompetent guard was already too late to stop six of the jumpers… Daniel attempted to circle around to see what had happened to delay number seven, but backed hastily away when more black-uniformed SFs began shouting in the distance. He had maybe ten minutes before the troops arrived to hunt him down. 

He found a hidden tunnel access point close by, and disappeared right into the sand. Whoever was on the seventh jumper would have to look out for themselves, for now. 

Michelle ignored the urgent calls to her from the other six shuttles. With a huff, she eyed comms and breathlessly gulped out, “Can’t get it to lift off! You guys go!”

Michelle hadn’t been entirely truthful with her fellow conspirators, not from the beginning. But then, none of them knew that her ‘sister’, or rather, her daughter Amanda, half-Lantean with a strong ATA-B Gene, even stronger than her own, had been loaded into a buffer on one of the Lantean-piloted shuttles. Her baby’s Lantean father had been given sole custody, and Michelle was lucky to be able to spot the now eight-year-old from a distance, most days. She was only allowed once-a-month visitation if she maintained the fiction that the child was her ‘sister’, not her daughter. And there would be no hope of her ever getting to see her baby again if she went through with the evacuation with the other Gene Orphans. 

So, of course, she had faked a failure of her shuttle during the first escape attempt, and another now. 

When the SFs swarmed angrily into her shuttle, she raised her hands at once and yelled, “I give up!”

She had also been less-than-truthful about what exactly her shuttle carried. One of the few without culling buffers, it was filled with crates of stunners and zats. She had taken care to supply herself with several, taken off her when she was first captured. But now she had a better idea where they would look, and had thrown one under another shuttle some distance on the way leading back to the town. Faking a trip and fall, she retrieved the weapon and clutched it tight, hiding it under her shirt. 

She could not allow anyone or anything to separate her from her child.

Å 

Some hours earlier…

“Okay,” said McKay from Jumper One, “they’ve got the shield up and keyed to refuse entry to unauthorized jumpers. That would be us. But they got Kavanagh to do the work… and I taught that little weasel everything he knows. So give me a second and I can just shut the whole thing down…”

“Wait wait wait!” Daniel warned over the comms from Jumper SG-1. “There’s a sand-storm forming up in the east. It’s gonna hit a little after dawn, as expected. You take the shield down and everyone in that town caught outside the catacombs is dead, whether they take cover in the above-ground buildings or not. That’s not even to mention the potential property damage… They’re gonna be in enough trouble even if the dome is up. Do we really want to do that?”

“I’m game,” Jack declared grimly. 

“Well I’m not. Have you ever seen what’s left of a human body after it’s been caught in a sand-storm? It isn’t much!”

McKay huffed. “No problem. Since we’ll have people of our own in there too, we don’t need to be hasty. I’m hacking the authorization list… okay. It’ll accept us all now. Oh, damn… You said any dome has to be specially keyed for sand-storms, Daniel?”

“Yeah, harmonized for low-kinetic intrusion. Otherwise, naquadah-enhanced sands just tear right through it.”

“Well, my every-so-brilliant colleague Kavanagh forgot about that, or never knew… There. Adjusted. Harry, Luna, you can get in and out with your… hocus-pocus?”

Harry, he and Luna hitching a ride on Jumper One, nodded, “Oh yeah. No problem. We’ll have to apparate into the plaza, though. We don’t know Abydos, or Nagada, as well as Daniel does to appear anywhere else.”

“Be careful,” Daniel warned. “It’s not just the Lantean guards you need to worry about. They’re soon going to be the least of your problems. The Abydons know better than to be outside at all in one of these storms. Even with a shield up and properly harmonized, the winds are still too strong to survive out in the open. Once it hits, you’ll need to get to cover as soon as you can.”

“Got it. I guess we can assume the Lanteans won’t be similarly warned?”

McKay huffed. “Since when do they pay attention to anything not on the City? Or believe us even if we try to warn them?”

“But they’ve had hours now to clear the town and prepare for our arrival,” O’Neill warned. “That means barricades, sniper and gun emplacements… Gibbs is really fond of that type of thing. Ya know, I’m still not liking this plan of yours, Daniel,” the Alpha Sentinel protested, “even less with this storm thing building. Why don’t we just wait it out, strike when the winds die down?”

“That could take days, Jack. Sometimes as much as a ten-day. Blair says they’ve got Carson Beckett in the mastage barns… probably the other six captives there as well… not a good place to be if they get cut off by the storm. We need to get them out of there. Don’t worry. I know every single secret way in and out of that town, and I know what to do in a storm. Plus I can make contact with Kasuf, Skarra and the gang… they need to know the plan, that we’ve got it covered.”

Blair had enough of an empathic connection to his old student Carson that he had been able to suss out where he was from the Spirit Plane. Oddly, it seemed to Blair that Carson was even more… available, than he had been before. Was Carson surfacing as a shaman, at long last?

The timing wasn’t great, of course, but the timing of a traumatic emergence was never good. By definition.

“The only thing the storm changes is the timing,” Sheppard insisted. “We need to hustle to get everyone in and in position before everything is locked down. So. Is everyone good to go?”

Å 

One of the jumpers John and Rodney had salvaged and repaired had been on a mission to gather Novelle native wildlife specimens in culling buffers. When the small craft had run out of power and been abandoned, the buffers had been left behind, empty. So they now had over a dozen of the devices, ready and waiting to be filled with… whatever. Rodney had been curious enough at one point, wondering what the things had been originally designed for, and why, that he had searched the Atlantis database. The current versions had one significant difference from the source blueprints in the FS databank… the originals would only pick up human life signs. The amended versions picked up anything, living or inanimate. Rodney still wondered, a lot, about the things… why only dematerialize and capture humans, after all? Although, knowing now what he did of the Wraith… At this point, he was afraid to ask… not relevant anyway, or so he could only hope. 

O’Neill and Sheppard had come up with a plan, endorsed by Ellison. Daniel had provided invaluable insider intel on Abydos, and Rodney had supplied the tech they would need. Radek’s little fleet had been unloaded of their cargo and turned over to those with the necessary Gene and piloting experience. Jumpers had been ferrying militia and sentinel volunteers to Port Ath on Athos Island from all over Novelle, since they got the news about the Abydos invasion. Port Ath had become their collection point, home base and staging area for the effort to re-take Abydos. 

Stage One called for five of Rodney’s reconditioned jumpers to transport sentinels (and their shamans or guides) to infiltrate Nagada covertly, using Daniel’s knowledge of the many secret tunnels under the town. They would spread out and hide, and from cover use their formidable senses to locate and map every Lantean within the shield dome. Not all of their sentinels would be able to land for this stage, of course, since some of them, with the ATA Gene, were needed as jumper pilots. That took O’Neill, Sheppard, Spencer Reid, Don Eppes, a few others, out of the equation. They would provide back-up and emergency evac for the advance scout teams, in case of trouble.

Stage Two would have those five jumpers coast over the town and sweep up the identified enemy in culling beams. Their pilots had the most experience and skill in flying the jumpers, when tricky maneuvering might be required, either because of the on-coming storm, Lantean resistance, or unforeseen complications. 

Meanwhile, a separate mission would be underway to liberate Atlantis. Cascade’s Jumper Six was already assigned to Methos and Henry Morgan at the thermal power plant, so was unavailable for either operation, but waiting in the wings. One of the first claimed Lantean shuttles landed at Cheyenne had been emptied, then loaded with a pilot and handful of militia volunteers, then flown out to Rainier for the use of Ramirez and the MacLeod cousins, and more volunteers out of the Sanctuary. They would first rendezvous at Port Ath. From there, they would organize what teams they figured they would need, load up a few extra jumpers confiscated by Radek Zelenka’s escapees, and check out Atlantis in the wake of Leon Vance’s little coup. Morgan and Methos would meet them there, to plug in their power unit, once the City was confirmed in safe hands.

Hopefully, Stage Two of the Abydos liberation could be completed before the sand-storm hit. Daniel had warned them that even the jumpers might not be able to stay in the air, with such strong winds and scouring sand shards, and would need to take cover… either in a vale like the one the Lanteans were using (although they were likely to be covered and buried in sand by the end, whole dunes tending to be moved in the winds), or above the clouds, and then returning to their Port Ath operations base. 

Stage Three would wait until the storm had passed. Once the Lantean numbers were reduced to ‘manageable’ size (whatever that meant to the sentinels and trained militia in charge) the combined Elper Coalition militia volunteers, carried in by any available jumpers and confiscated shuttles, would gather up the remaining invaders in Nagada, if there were any loose and surviving. With their prisoners in custody, one way or another, they would return a liberated Abydos to the Abydons.

Stage Four would see them assemble prisoners and all captured ordnance on the Alpha Site Island. That might take a while, as they intended to offload all cargo from the twenty five Lantean shuttles to Alpha Island, so that all jumpers and shuttles would then be in Elper possession. 

Stage Five would be a combination showdown and negotiation with the Lanteans. Those still standing would be presented with their options, and some kind of agreement struck. Then those in buffers would be decanted, buffer by buffer, and offered the choice, of remaining on the Alpha Site with the bulk of the Lanteans, free to build whatever utopia they liked on their own, or joining one of the Elper communities. If any would have them.

And, yes, even those in the buffers the Gene Orphans had taken, would be offered the choice. From here on out, *no one* would be forced away from families, or from their chosen home.

Everything else was negotiable. Provided, naturally, they had the leverage to negotiate. 

For instance, as far as the Elpers were concerned, it was highly unlikely any jumpers would end up in Lantean hands, after all was said and done. Their shield dome and a few generators? Perhaps. Food, clothing, personal possessions? Well yes. The Elpers weren’t thieves, after all. 

Any weapons or explosives? That would have to depend. On how likely the Lanteans might be to turn them on others, rather than the far more important goal of keeping their own people safe where they were. Confidence was not high that they could be trusted not to try their Abydos operation again, there or somewhere else. But neither would anyone be willing to leave them completely unprotected (except maybe Jack) from potential goa’uld attacks.

Å 

Harry Potter, Alpha Sentinel of Hogwarts and half-Magical, didn’t know how he had managed to talk his team members, vanguard Ron Weasley and tech Hermione Granger, into staying behind this time. The operation called for creeping around and spying, and his old friends loved that kind of thing. But they only had Harry’s dad’s old invisibility cloak for protection, and it would only cover, at most, two adults at a time. 

The Peverill Cloak of Invisibility, also called Death’s Shroud, was famed in legend and fairy tale, considered by those who believed it existed at all as one of the great lost treasures of the Magical home-world. Very, *very* few people knew Harry had it. In situations like this, proof against sentinel sight and Lantean technology, it was an invaluable advantage. Even the life signs detectors couldn’t pierce it. Sound or scent could betray him and Luna, but they weren’t too worried about that, in a big abandoned town with growing sand-filled winds moaning and shrieking through otherwise empty streets. As far as anyone knew, there were no Lantean sentinels anyway.

Although Harry was termed half-Magical, as opposed to those, like Luna and Ron, who were Purebloods, he actually came from three Pureblood lines. Only one grandparent had been human. That was just enough genetic inheritance, though, for him to have carried the sentinel gene complex. Like the ATA, only those with some human ancestry carried the potential. Shamans could arise in Pureblood, half or purely human lines, since the ability was not inherited, as such. But sentinels and the ATA? You had to be at least part human. 

But then, it worked the other way around, too. No matter how much, or how little, Magical ancestry you had, as long as there was at least one Magical back there on your family tree, you could be born with the swirling multi-colored eyes. Only then could you express the ability to use magic to manipulate matter and energy, use wands and staffs, see certain magical beings, such as thestrals, ghosts, unicorns, or, it was said, dementors. Then again, occasionally, and growing more prevalent as inbreeding became a greater problem, even the child of Purebloods could be born without the magical signature eyes, so-called ‘squibs’ without magical ability. 

His Guardian team-mate Hermione had once tried to explain the genetic inheritance thing to him, but he hadn’t really listened. Not his problem, not his concern, and certainly none of his business. You had it or you didn’t, like manifesting as a sentinel, emerging as a shaman, or having that quirky ATA Gene. And he was just as glad he hadn’t been stuck with an ATA. *That* would have been a disaster, as far as he could see. 

When his parents had died in a mysterious accident, when he was barely a year old, he had been sent to his mother’s sister to be raised. Aunt Petunia, and her husband Vernon Dursley, were as human as they came, in the metalworkers guild out of Hellmouth. They had no use for a magical orphan, were embarrassed to even admit he existed. When the Lanteans came with their testing kits, Harry had been terrified he would be taken away, even from this little bit of home. The Dursleys had been bitterly disappointed their beloved son Dudley had been rejected… that would have counted as an honor, in their eyes, a Lantean son. 

Harry counted himself lucky that Rupert Giles, a teacher at the school in Sunnydale and half-Magical himself, had intervened with Petunia, and sent him to Hogwarts for magical training. Going to school there, among others like himself, had been a welcome revelation. The bonds he had formed with classmates Ron, Hermione and Luna, had lasted his life. He took pride in both his human and Magical heritage, and welcomed the duties of being a Guardian Alpha Sentinel.

Å 

Rodney had supplied them both with ear-buds for communication, then assigned them the harbor area and plaza for their search. Whatever comprehensive search of the town the Lantean SFs had done were completed by now, and most of the life-signs Rodney had found spread all over Nagada were stationary, or pacing a predictable circuit. They waited for the Lantean SFs on sentry duty on the walls and in the plaza to take cover from the gritty sand-filled wind. The opportunity came soon enough, as a general call went out over the Lantean comm channels Rodney had hacked into, that there were escaped prisoners at their shuttle landing field, attempting to steal more of the small craft… it was enough of a distraction, even if the sentries there were ordered to hold position. 

Harry and Luna landed perfectly in a swirl of apparition, in the middle of the market plaza. Harry hurriedly pulled his cloak out of hiding and swept it over he and his wife. Yes, there was a strong and unpleasantly stinging breeze in the wide-open space, but not yet the gale-force winds they were expecting. Still, it was enough to push the heavy cloak against their legs, and hinting at shoes beneath the fluttering hems. The pair raced to the nearest building, the Council Hall, with its white marble columns and arched colonnade. 

Silently, they entered the structure, found the stairs right where Daniel had promised they’d be, and climbed quietly and cautiously to the roof. Part of the building was under a dome cupola, but there were also flat areas, and a bit of balustrade, carved with animal heads… the mastages, no doubt. As they expected, there were two sniper posts, one each side of the dome. A simple whispered spell revealed four men, two and two. Nodding to each other, Harry and Luna used the *petrificus totalis* charm to send the first pair to the slate tiles. Another spell quickly bound them in magicked ropes and a gag. Then they crept up on the unaware second pair, and repeated the procedure. 

Luna took the comms from them all and they made their own little nest in the cover of a corner of the building roof. Very few women were part of the Lantean SFs, not as active line soldiers at any rate, snipers or soldiers, so if a security check was required, it couldn’t be Luna they heard… Harry was going to be too busy, but, fortunately, there was a charm Luna could use to disguise her voice. 

Then Harry began to focus his formidable senses on the down-town section of Nagada. When he closed in on a presence, he used other spells to reveal who, how many and how well armed… it just seemed easier. He knew that Rodney McKay was doing similar with the tech aboard Jumper One. It didn’t take him long to identify the large number of Lanteans in the nearby naquadah refinery, and another clutch in the storage silos. Of course the invaders would want to secure those vital facilities.

Jack O’Neill, John Sheppard, Spencer Reid, Don Eppes and Xander Harris piloted jumpers over their heads to locate each reported Lantean station and SF-manned post, and each roving squad and team. But as the weather grew heavier, it affected their scanners to an increasing degree. Sentinel volunteers on the ground gathered more precise and accurate information on those spread through the town. 

Sight wasn’t much help in the narrow streets and obstructed views, and the wind did mess with scent, but sound was near infallible with sentinels, especially those bonded, and particularly those Alphas bonded to shamans. Although it wasn’t exactly touch, they were able to detect heat signatures as well, to a fine degree of accuracy and at some distance, through wood and stone, even naquadah, unlike most of their tech. That might yet be their most valuable sense, as the howling of the storm winds were expected to get much worse, and in very short order.

Alpha Prime Jim Ellison, young but powerful Buffy Summers, the stiff but determined Aaron ‘Hotch’ Hotchner, each took lead on a team for patrolling a third of the town, certain they could avoid any on watch or approach. Alpha Shamans Blair and Willow were with their sentinels, but Hotch was on his own, since Spencer was piloting their Pastureland jumper. And Daniel, with his specialized knowledge, had his own assignment and agenda. But at least Jack wasn’t on the ground, behind enemy lines and battling the coming storm conditions without his shaman.

Rodney had designated the Pastureland craft as Jumper Four, but as soon as she had seen it, their Guardian team tech, Penelope Garcia, had declared it ‘Big And Ugly’… so they were all calling it BAU. Garcia was sitting in the co-pilot chair next to Spencer, her own (successfully hidden) ATA-B Gene an equal to Spencer’s. The shaman was in danger of over-extending his abilities, since he was attempting to assist his sentinel with control at a considerable distance, as well as the tricky jumper piloting that would be required. Just as well he had Garcia with him… she was the better pilot, anyway, and had squealed in delight at the on-board tech and particularly the heads-up-display, which she immediately took to calling HUD. Spencer had noted that the Pastureland residents seemed to prefer alphabet designations for pretty much everything. Most referred to Pastureland itself as FBI… for the proper name, *‘Foro Boario Italia’*. But then, the Hellmouth Guardians had taken to calling their Jumper Three ‘Scooby’, so he imagined all the jumpers would be getting nicknames eventually. 

The other sentinels, those unbonded or with guides, were sent to stationary posts in more covert locations, most with quick access to hatches into the underground catacombs. Their duties at this point were more for infiltration, to hunker down in the nearest bunkers during the storm, so they could be ready to lead the assault on whoever was left in the town after it passed. Derek Morgan of Pastureland, Ronon Dex of Smuggler’s Reach, Pete Shanahan of Stargate Commune, Ian Edgerton, G. Callen and Sam Hanna of LA were all on that list.

Å 

Harry didn’t bother listening over the ear-bud, as he could hear them sound off from their various positions. He let Luna deal with the jumpers and the Lantean comms. 

Her wheeling eyes sparkling in the shadows, even as the sun rose over the horizon, but muted by all the debris swirling in the air, Luna gave him a fond smile as she rested a hand on his back, her touch and her aura aiding him to get a better bead on a gun emplacements the sentinels on the ground had missed. 

He called out, “Hotch, don’t turn that corner. There’s a team on the roof of the building on the northwest corner of that intersection. It’s down-wind of you so you won’t smell it… You’ll be walking right into their range of fire.”

“Thanks, Potter.”

Å 

Gibbs soon called out over his command channel. “Sniper Teams Alpha and Bravo, sending you one more team to cover the plaza. They’ll take the east side, across the canal, over the refinery. Just a head’s up.”

“Acknowledged,” Luna grumbled back. Hopefully, the Commander wouldn’t recognize the voice, or be bothered by that. Nodding to Harry, she hustled to the other side of the dome and propped up the still restrained and immobilized pair so that only the top of their heads showed above the balustrade, and balanced the tip of their sniper rifle artistically. Hopefully, that would be enough to reassure the third approaching team that both pairs were still at their assigned positions. 

Å 

“Okay, guys?” came Daniel’s somewhat muffled and staticky voice, probably from somewhere far lower than street level, and partially blocked by the naquadah everywhere. “If you’re going to do this, it’s got to be now. The storm is less than half an hour away, and it’s a big one. A real howler. Those of you on the ground, you need to get to cover, now. I can steer you to the nearest catacomb access, but you need to move, now. Jumpers, you need to fly out or land within the next fifteen minutes, or you’re toast. This thing will blow you right out of the air.”

Rodney’s voice was much clearer over comms. “Okay, I think we have most of the enemy targets painted for pick up. Jumpers, begin your sweeps now. Jack, wait till you get confirmation the SF duty teams are in hand before you clear out the barracks. They have to be last, or we’ll be warning Vance what’s happening. Then, like Daniel said, we’ve got fifteen, so make it count.” 

Harry watched as almost immediately, a white beam shot out into the growing gloom and rising wind, and passed over the third sniper nest on the market plaza… leaving nothing but space behind. Another moving column of white shifted over the Council Hall, picking up the two still-restrained pairs. 

Harry grinned, and packed away the cloak. He reached a hand to help Luna stand, and they made tracks for the roof hatch. They already knew the closest tunnel access was in the Council Hall basement. Once Harry lifted the solid stone cover with a levitation charm, he and Luna hurried down the stairs, letting the stone fall behind them to hide their exit. 

Harry reported all clear to Daniel, and they followed the line of glowing lamps to a door that Daniel held open for them with a grin. 

“Welcome to the catacombs, Harry, Luna. Make yourselves comfortable, while someone brings you drinks and snacks…”

Å 

One by one, the teams they had in the town found their way to the catacomb bunkers, as Daniel carefully counted them all off. As precious minutes ticked by, they grew more worried about Hotch… he was the last sentinel unaccounted for. 

“No no,” Spencer assured, although his voice was somewhat raised in stress all the sentinels could read, “we’ve got one more squad to pick up, and they’re in his way to the nearest bunker exit… there. Hotch! You’ve got a go. Run for it!”

Moments later, the tall man came stumbling in after Daniel, choking, coughing and shaking his head, sand falling all around him, rubbing grit from his sore and reddened eyes, into the large main chamber of the catacombs, and the primary collection point for the population. Daniel passed him a bottle of water to help him clear his throat. 

“Wow,” the Alpha Sentinel commented with more calm than the others expected. “You guys aren’t kidding about those storms. They’re pretty brutal.”

“You okay, Hotch?” asked the anxious voice of Spencer over the increasingly staticky comms.

“I’m fine, Spencer. You get out of here before it’s too late.”

“On our way, boss-man,” Garcia assured. 

Derek Morgan joined his Alpha, helping him find a seat. The sentinel, it appeared, was shakier than any of them realized, or he wanted to let on.

“Anyone else left out there?” he asked.

Daniel shook his head, and consulted his own ear-bud. “We already secured the two guards they had on the catacomb gates. All of our people are accounted for and safe. All teams are either here or on the jumpers, and they’ve all left the danger zone. But… I don’t think the Lanteans are going to be as lucky.”

“How many Lanteans are left?” Harry asked. 

Å 

That was a very good question. And Leon Vance didn’t have an answer. 

“What do you mean, you can’t contact the squads?” he demanded of Commander Gibbs, sitting at the hastily-set-up comms center. 

They had taken over the round, well-appointed room at the top of the north Gate Tower as their command post. This was obviously its main purpose, and set up by the locals as such. 

Kavanagh, their one tech expert, hadn’t bothered to even turn on any of the local equipment, wrinkling his nose at it, sniffing, then opening up his own tablet. So he no idea that McKay had set up the console desks against the walls for comms and surveillance, even warning scanners on the water access points, for goa’uld detection and flood levels. There was also some advanced tech for monitoring weather conditions… if any of the Lanteans knew how to turn any of it on, which they didn’t. And they all ignored the significance of the big red-painted lever on the wall, that was pulled to activate the emergency warning system, bells and alarms that would ring out all over the town for storms, floods or goa’uld attacks, alerting the people to get to the catacombs immediately.

The only feature they focused on was a large prominent conference table, which held a three dimensional topographical map of the island in its center, with an inset for Nagada, outlining walls, streets, canals, bridges, major buildings. If they had known to turn any of them on, embedded monitors marked out all kinds of additional detail: remote identification of where every human and mastage was currently positioned, weather conditions, some inventory of food, water, forage and ore shipments, as well as town conditions, lock and bridge positions, barge locations, ships in the harbor piers (none at the moment), tide and flood levels… any or all of it would no doubt have been of use to the would-be invaders.

Oddly enough, the one thing the maps did not show were the catacombs, or any of the access points.

The table map had certainly been useful to them, though. Little paper tokens charted their progress in clearing the town, and allowed Gibbs to determine the best locations for sniper nests, gun emplacements and barricades. 

Standing by the wall, ramrod straight, Chief Warrant Officer Robert Makepeace, and seated at the planning table, Intel Unit Chief Eli David, looked totally unimpressed with the stone-faced Security Force Squadron Commander. Seated near her father, Ziva was watching intently and playing with her knife. She had been in command of the sentry team for the north wall, called inside when weather conditions became too hazardous for them, and the wind and blowing sand obscured every method of watch in any case. In a corner out of the way, the rest of her team, Rivkin, Cruz and SFD Vivian Blackadder (Gibbs’ pick for their armed back-up team), exchanged glances. At the various dark and inert monitor consoles, Kavanagh and the seven other members of Vance’s tech staff, were struggling with their Lantean tablets, attempting to look busy and competent. 

“The storm is whipping up something of a frenzy out there, in case you hadn’t noticed,” Gibbs bit out, and he had to raise his voice just to overcome the howling of the wind outside, rattling the windows, now covered and sealed behind heavy metal shutters. “The naquadah alone is playing havoc with our comms. The shield will protect us from most of the worst of it, I’d guess, but it won’t stop the wind, and there’s enough debris inside to make it tough on anyone out and unprotected. We’re going to have to hope our sentries, snipers and gunners have sense enough to get inside and into shelter. And it might not have been the most sound notion to set up our command center here at the town walls. Something more central with more layers of buildings around it for protection might have been a better choice.” 

The Gate Tower had seemed an ideal location when they arrived, with the superior observation post on the walls, and barracks nearby along the north wall for their off-duty personnel. But although they had all heard of the power of Abydon sand-storms, and had been warned that one was coming… none of these city-dwellers had ever experienced the true might of nature’s fury. They had no frame of reference for just how dangerous these storms could be. As soon as their own sentries had spotted the approaching black cloud, boiling up from the northeastern horizon, speeding their way right down the Nile Valley like a wind tunnel, Gibbs had shouted commands and orders, to return to base if possible, to get to cover if not.

Only one of their teams was present and accounted for. Chris Pacci and his team had been the ones to go check on the shuttles, and bring back their one Gene Orphan pilot, Michelle Lee. She had been handed over to the troops presently occupying the barracks under the north wall, and under lock and key. After the debacle of the escaping prisoners, they had beefed up Ned’s back-up with three more, seasoned, SFs, to prevent any more losses. That was barely before the storm closed in. Gibbs’ mentor, Mike Franks, and his team had stayed with the trainees in Shuttle 1. And yes, trusting any kind of defense to the two green trainees had been an error… But Franks could be trusted not to mess that up any further. 

But returning late to the command post, Pacci and his guys had been severely rattled by what they had narrowly escaped out there on the streets. 

Pacci reported, “It’s getting bad out there. No sight, the wind is deafening, the grit… can’t even breathe properly in that. Even sentinels would be useless out there right now, even if we had any. But… I thought… for a moment, I thought I spotted a culling beam out there on one of the rooves… that wasn’t us?”

Everyone blinked at him, then turned accusing eyes on Gibbs. “Not by my order. Pacci, get on comms, call for a sound-off. I want everyone who can to report in.”

“Sir, the interference…”

“Do it! Kavanagh, anything you can do about that?”

“Like what?” protested the annoying geek.

“Like clear up some of the interference!”

Even Ned Dorneget out at Shuttle 1 was having difficulty getting through. 

“I had to shut up the back hatch, sir. Too much sand getting in. It’s piling up, sir… think the whole dune is blowing in on top of us!”

“Sit tight, Dorneget,” Pacci recommended. 

“Sir… we don’t have much water, and food rations only for a couple days with the five of us…”

“Sit tight.” It was the only advice, and the only order, Pacci felt he could give. 

The sound-off proceeded… but no one liked what they were hearing… or rather, not hearing. Two more teams and one sniper post had reported in, having found cover in basements. But that was it. And no one thought to contact the off-duty personnel in the barracks and billets. That alone might have given them a more accurate idea of their current status. 

“But…” Vance scrambled for a suitable reaction, even as his staff hustled to close and bar storm-windows, lock and bar doors, batten down everything they could, and inventory what supplies they had with them to last out the storm. “But… that’s only about a dozen men accounted for out of over three hundred on active shift! What the hell? Gibbs?”

“Comms are wonky at best,” Gibbs growled. “They’re out there… just can’t reach us. For the time being.” 

Pacci winced, thinking of poor young Ned’s plea. Stuck out there in basements or wherever, with no water and no food… Abydon storms were supposed to last days. The Command Post had some rations with them, and the tower had a well and pump that seemed to be working okay… 

For now, they were all stuck right where they were, helpless, trapped, their only course of action to wait out a storm of unknown duration. 

But they all must realize… it wouldn’t take long before the situation turned very ugly. 

Å


	16. Chapter 16: Now they were up the Wazoo River without a paddle, and no mistake.

Å 

High above the black, black clouds boiling over Abydos, turning dawn into night with their thick swirling sands, Rodney’s jumpers assembled. Communications over their comms was all but impossible. Those in the jumpers just had to trust that all was well below them, and going according to plan. Those with a more intimate, albeit mystical, connection, were satisfied that their mates were well. 

Jack O’Neill, in Jumper SG-1, could feel his mate at complete ease, comfortable, as always in the arms of his chosen family. 

Spencer Reid, piloting Jumper Four, assigned to Pastureland and nicknamed BAU (Big And Ugly) by his Guardian Team tech Garcia, was reassured by the sense that his sentinel, Hotch, was feeling relieved and somewhat amused by his concern. 

John Sheppard, in Jumper One, as the Alpha for Smuggler’s Reach, and therefore the Guardian of Abydos, had official command of this portion of the plan. 

“This is Jumper One. Sound off, guys.” 

“Jumper SG-1, ready to move out,” Jack acknowledged. 

“Jumper Scooby, present and correct,” came Xander Harris’ voice from Jumper Three, the Hellmouth jumper.

“Jumper BAU, technical goddess Garcia reporting, as our boy genius is still fretting over the controls while our fearless leader is stuck underground,” Garcia chirped happily. Her Alpha Shaman was none too familiar with the controls. Rodney had barely delivered the shuttle to their Quantico facility before they had been scheduled to leave for the Inauguration. But Garcia had been practicing.

“Seneschal Five here,” Amanda’s voice informed them, “and we’re calling her Angel from here on out. She is, after all, the LA seneschal, therefore Los Angeles, Angel. And we’re loaded down with a culling buffer full of invaders, just like the rest of you. You do know how uncomfortable these damn devices make me, don’t you? You realize that they’re Wraith tech?”

“You can freak out about that later,” Rodney recommended. “I certainly plan to. But for now… everyone ready to go, John.”

“Fine. Next stop, Alpha Site Island.”

“Right where I told them to go in the first place,” Spencer Reid grumbled. 

“You and me both, kid,” Rodney agreed. 

Å 

Alpha Site Island (it hadn’t had a name before Reid had surveyed and chosen it for the Atlantis emergency fall-back evacuation site) was one of hundreds dotting the wide ocean in the Central Basin. Each one had their advantages and disadvantages as far as colony settlements went. Spencer had chosen for fresh water source adequate for a population double the current size of Atlantis, enough other resources for the support and building of infrastructure: trees, a deposit of naquadah they would have to dig down for, enough stone to quarry for building materials, a suitable defensible cove to turn into a harbor, once piers, breakwaters and bulwarks had been constructed. The island was shaped like a crescent moon, wrapped around the sheltered bay, with forests, meadows, spring-fed lakes and rivers, a rocky headland to protect against the prevailing winds in case of storms rushing in from the ocean. The headland contained granite and marble for quarrying, and an extensive cave system for immediate shelter and storage. It would also provide access for mining works to the ores below. 

Its worst feature was how remote from the usual shipping lanes it was… something Spencer and Rodney had privately thought might actually be its best advantage. Since the Captain and the Officer Elite never looked at the reports anyway, none had noticed this particular detail.

Spencer had hoped, along with then Chief Science Officer Rodney McKay, that the Officer Elite would have tried to make some kind of start on preparing the Alpha Site for habitation. Setting up minimal infrastructure, clearing areas for building and constructing foundation platforms for shelters, maybe storage silos for non-perishable food and supplies, begin prepping fields for cultivation, establish greenhouses... Not to mention scoping out the best place for a harbor… they’d need that sooner rather than later, once relocated. While Atlantis still had the power, their advanced tech and equipment would have made it a relatively simple project. Having started his planning years ago, they’d had more than enough time to build a whole permanent settlement… if they had bothered to listen and take the coming threat seriously. There should have been absolutely no need whatsoever to steal someone else’s home. It was just another blatant example of the greed and entitlement of Lantean arrogance. 

They hadn’t even been very good in their invasion attempt. 

There was one particular cave on the Alpha Site where they could safely stow the culling buffers. They would leave their prisoners in stasis for now, until ready to decant them. But just on the off-chance that the native wildlife might get in and do damage, Xander, with Rupert Giles and a few of their Hellmouth teen militia, had volunteered to stay behind to guard the cache. 

Landing in a loose circle around the cave mouth, they carried in the bulky devices called culling buffers, and placed them inside. 

O’Neill dusted off his hands with a satisfied smirk. “Good job. Now back to Port Ath and the rest of the militia, John?”

“Um…” Amanda ventured. “I have an alternate suggestion for Angel. Methos and Henry, on Cascade’s Jumper Six, from here on out to be known as Guide by the way, are preparing to plug in the thermal power plant back into the City. My old buddies Ramirez and the MacLeods are on their way to the City as we speak, along with a lot of sentinels who have nothing better to do, and would rather like a shot at taking over Atlantis in the name of the Elper Coalition. They’re leading the charge with a confiscated shuttle they’re calling Seneschal, just so you know. Since the Lanteans have been such lousy care-takers all this time, and obviously don’t deserve her when they’re making her so unhappy…”

“Yes, and? But, so, therefore?” O’Neill prompted.

“Well, you guys have this covered. Plenty of jumpers and pilots, plenty of volunteer militia to keep the Lanteans in line. You don’t need us as well. But you have no idea just how much trouble Methos and the MacLeods can get into if not properly supervised. I think Don, Tony and I should fly Angel out to meet the MacLeods. That’s a party I really don’t want to miss. ”

John and Jack both exchanged speaking looks… obviously tempted to go along. 

Don smirked at them. “Get your final part of the Invasion arrests made in time, if the sand-storm cooperates, and you can join us on the City. There may still be something left for you to do. For our part… we’re going to try and take the place without bloodshed… We’ll bring any surrenders here. After all, they belong together.”

John sighed and shrugged. “Okay, fine. But you know… the City? She likes me best. You’re going to need me at some point. And I think Atlantis falls more into the Smuggler’s Reach jurisdiction than any other.”

Don shrugged. “Point.”

Å 

While the heavy element naquadah played havoc with any technology they had at their disposal, and storm conditions disrupted sentinel senses, it didn’t impair the abilities of the shamans at all. Daniel conferred with Kasuf, then called a shaman circle together. Technically, Alpha Prime Blair out-ranked him, but Abydos was the home of Daniel’s heart, and no one disputed his right to take charge here.

There were five shamans in the local Nagadan circle, all of them older women serving their tribe as healers and elders. They joined the Alphas present, Daniel, Blair, Luna and Willow. Seated in the main catacomb cavern, the walls painted with stories, myths, histories, lanterns glowing gold, flickering over the faces of the silent people as the storm raged far above… 

The dark orange auras of terrified Lanteans weren’t all that difficult to find. Five pockets altogether. The largest was in the north Gate Tower, twenty living minds. Not hard to guess that was where Vance and his command staff were holed up. A group of five in the jumper outside the walls, fast being buried in sand. Two four-man teams and one two-man team trapped in basements scattered across the town. None of them would be able to last more than a couple days without water or food, though the Gate Tower group were in a better situation there. They had access to water, and there was some food stored there, if they could find it.

Those in basements were readily reachable. Skarra organized some of his militia to go with the sentinels to find and collect those trapped by the storm. They would be disarmed and brought back in restraints, bags over their heads to preserve Nagada’s secret ways in and out. As for the five in the jumper… 

“Skarra and I will take that one,” Daniel offered, getting extremely skeptical looks from his fellow Alphas. 

“Er, Daniel,” Blair ventured, “I don’t think Jack will be too happy with that.”

“Jack isn’t here, and he knows better than to argue with me about something like this. We know the situation, the conditions… those five people are dead if we don’t make some effort to go get them. I don’t want that on my conscience. We have to at least try. Look, the only way to get them at this point is to take out a mastage team. The beasts will provide the cover we need, and the muscle to plow out the sand to dig them out. The closest tunnel access is already too buried to reach, so we take them back to the barns, and there’s an access to the catacombs right there. We need to shut the barn entry gate and make sure the automated food and water systems are operating properly out there anyway. Guys, I promise you, Skarra and me, we can handle this. Not to worry.”

“Yeah, well, that not worrying thing?” Blair muttered. “Easier said than done.”

With a jaunty grin, Daniel slapped Skarra’s shoulder, and the two young men geared up in mastage-woven robes over mastage-leather vests and leggings. Scarves wrapped around their heads held filter masks in place, under hoods to obscure all but goggle-protected eyes… A squad of Abydon militia in similar get-up trailed after them. 

Å 

SFD Trainee Ned Dorneget, ATA-C, shuttle pilot, might be the only person capable of operating the shuttle, but he fully realized he was low man on this current totem pole. Even his first guard, SFD Trainee Jasper Miller, counted more than he did… not because of any seniority or official rank, but because the Millers were connected right to the top of the command chain. As for the three SFs sent after they’d let those prisoners escape… they were all scary in their own way. Mike Franks was Team Lead, a weathered and gruff bastard to rival even Gibbs, his one-time protégé. The other two, Abigail Borin and Nick Torres, were seasoned soldiers. Nothing was permitted to get past their grim all-business faces, no hint of realization of just how totally screwed they all were right now. Although the experienced Borin might look like the weak link, based purely on her gender, the mere fact she was one of the rare women in the ranks was proof enough she had earned her place.

As all five watched the front view screen pile up with sand, it was hard not to admit to themselves the truth. 

“We could lift off,” Borin suggested in a very neutral voice. “Fly back to Atlantis, if we have to. Food and water there, at least.”

“That would be abandoning our post, soldier,” Franks growled out. 

“No. It would be using our initiative in exigent circumstances to preserve high-value assets… the damn shuttle, if not for us, and one of our few pilots,” Borin countered.

Ned really, really wished he didn’t have to say this, because he really liked Borin’s plan… but, “It’s too late. From the readings on the wind force over the dome, it would blow us right out of the sky before we could get above it. *Maybe* it would blow us out to sea and we could dive under it, but… more than likely it would just slam us into the rocky cliffs on the west side of the town, or even smash us through the Nagada town walls.”

“So we just sit here and suffocate under all that sand, or starve and die of thirst because we have squat in the way of rations?” Nick guessed.

Ned gulped. And if rations were doled out according to priority… he knew exactly where he stood. There were rumors that SFD teams trapped in such situations, in downed shuttles stranded and unable to contact home, or in mine shaft collapses, elected to eat their weakest members so the rest could survive… Just rumors, he told himself. Stories to scare the trainees. But he didn’t like the way Franks was eyeing him up. His last physical evals had reported Ned was about ten pounds overweight… 

Then, suddenly, totally unexpected, so that it made all five jump and twist to face the front screen, there was a knock on the hull. The piles of sand shifted away, and they saw two figures, swathed in hoods and cloaks, making signals to get them to let down the rear hatch… 

“Hell no!” Franks protested, “Those aren’t our guys out there!”

“Hell yes,” Borin over-rode. “You’d rather sit it out, a ten-day or more, in here with no rations and no water? Well, if that’s what you want, that’s fine, but the rest of us are leaving. Torres, Miller, Dorneget, gather what you need.”

Franks gave a threatening growl and raised his weapon. Borin faced him down, just daring him to shoot her point-blank. 

For a moment, it all stood in the balance… then Ned punched the hatch release, and ran for the exit, Jason right behind him. Nick had raised his own weapon in support of Borin… and Franks collapsed with a shrug. 

“You’ll have to answer for this, Borin. Mutiny.”

“Yeah, like Vance or Gibbs have any room to complain on that score. Come on, Nick. This invasion is over for us, and I’m just as glad, to be honest. Didn’t like the way this thing was going from the out.”

In spite of the howling wind and driving sand, the curt gestures of the circle of robed figures were easy enough to figure out. Weapons down, hands at their backs, quickly cuffed, then more robes thrown over their shoulders, hoods on their heads. The complaining bellows of several huge mastages echoed even over the storm. In a marginally protected center, the prisoners were lead, stumbling over loose shifting sand, to what they could only hope was a measure of safety to ride out the weather.

It seemed hours before they were finally herded into the shelter of a cavern, their ears still deafened by the wind. Hoods torn off, gasping for air, still full of swirling sand that caught in their throats and gritted stinging into their eyes, but marginally breathable beyond heavy masks. Huge wooden doors were swung closed, half a dozen figures leaning to hold them shut against the fierce wind, then tree-trunk poles were dropped into brackets to hold the battered slabs in place. Slowly, the air began to clear of debris. 

While some silent figures kept weapons trained on them, others tended to the three mastages they had brought with them, un-harnessing, brushing off sand in thick drifting piles, returning them to pens. Others were monitoring some automated equipment, delivering hay and oats into hoppers, pumping water fountains into troughs. When the animals were cared for and settled, treats of apples, carrots and turnips offered, the still-silent figures made more gestures, and hustled their prisoners back into robes and hoods. It seemed there was a hidden passage from the barns, under the walls and into the town, and from there through underground ways that smelled like sewers… until eventually they were taken down steps, the clanging of re-enforced metal doors slamming behind them. 

Then, blessed light, clean air, and most of all, resonating silence. 

Å 

Franks made a quick study of the other Lantean groups gathered in a great hall, lit by flickering lanterns, lined with painted murals, filled with robed and leather-garbed Abydons. Of his people, all crowded in a partitioned-off alcove, there was a couple of low-rank guards, one crack sniper pair, and two teams of four, Burley’s and Balboa’s, all looking pretty damn demoralized. Ten men trained by Gibbs personally, so maybe they could be counted on to follow Franks’ lead… if he had a plan. Restrained, disarmed, surrounded by the enemy, and even if they could get themselves free, there was nowhere to go during a storm like that Powers-damned one above their heads… better to stand down, for now, let the damn Elpers think they’d give up. Lull them into a false sense of security. Always a good fall-back when you had nothing better to offer as a viable plan. So. Watch and wait.

Even though Dorneget, Miller, Borin and Torres had been sat nearby, all four avoided him. Just as well. He had nothing to say to a bunch of damn traitors. Maybe Borin had a point about there not being any other option but surrender, but damn it, she should have waited and let that be his call. This whole mess was going to leave egg on his face, especially where his Probie, Gibbs, was concerned, and that loss of face burned his butt. 

There was quite the conflab of Elpers going on over there on the other side of the cavern. He recognized the Alpha Primes and quite a few Alphas… sentinels stationed all around the huge room were watching them all with laser focus, even as the local maidens delivered cups of water and trays of food. 

One face made him growl. That damned turn-coat Jackson. 

Even before he left the City in disgrace for his unpopular theories – about which Franks didn’t really give a damn – he had been a thorn in the sides of all true Lanteans. He protested, loudly and often, the discrimination against the Gene Orphans (no better than potential traitors, any of them, in Franks’ view, as this little debacle had made all too plain), but worse, Jackson also argued against the treatment of all the Elpers. Time out of mind, the damn historian had got in the face of Kinsey, Vance, even Gibbs, over their failures in protecting the Elpers from goa’uld threats.

His very political stance had made him *persona no grata* on the City, so it was no wonder that he spent less and less time there, his digs and studies into ancient ruins an excuse to get away from his own people. No wonder the guy finally went native, married an Elper girl, settled on Abydos. With no Gene, no support and uncomfortable views, he was little loss to the City. Until that one goa’uld attack on Nagada forced him to emerge as a shaman. Franks knew a few in the Officer Elite had gone to him then, tried to talk him into coming home… and he refused. And while having a Lantean shaman might have been an advantage… not that one. Not that guy. More trouble than he was worth, always. No matter how gifted or brilliant.

So, when Jackson approached him with the Abydon chief elder and his son in tow, along with one Alpha pair, (and did it have to be those damn Hog-warty Magical freaks?), Franks bristled. 

Franks had little to no experience with Magicals. Damn Warties. He was actually quite proud of the fact. But then, sentinels, shamans and Warties were pretty much never seen on the City. And the Officer Elite liked it that way. Bad enough they were allowed on the decks for trade or the odd political doo, like an Inauguration. The tough old team lead had heard all the rumors, of course, most he discounted out of hand. But now, having to face these two, Alphas, a sentinel and shaman with known abilities he was dead leery of, he had to wonder at the extra oomph their magic might give them. They could already tell if he was lying, or hiding something… but were the rumors true? Could they actually read minds? Did they have a potion they could force on him to make him tell the truth? He glanced alarmed at the drink he had been guzzling down without suspicion. He carefully set the cup down and scowled. 

Damn freakish Warties. Gave him the willies, with their flashy eyes. Goa’uldy eyes, he always thought, when he caught even a glimpse of them from a distance. 

While the SFD Team Lead deliberately ignored the Warties, focused on Jackson, and pretty much forgot the two Abydons were even there, it was the elder who addressed him. 

“You present us with many problems, Lantean,” Kasuf told him, settling on a stool someone brought him. The others with him were also supplied with seats, ranged in a semi-circle, five people who confronted the five from the shuttle. “You come here to attack us, in force, to take our home from us. Yet you are little prepared for life here on Abydos. Without our rescue, all of you would surely have died before the storm passed. You are aware of this?”

There was no effort to make this conversation secret. Well, all the damn sentinels would listen in for sure, but the echoes in the huge hall carried and bounced around, so all could hear. The locals kept silent on the edges, letting the visiting Elpers keep the foreground, uncomfortable with the presence of their invasion guests. Balboa, Burley, their teams, the snipers, the guards… all were listening in avidly. And Franks had to admit… the storm had caught them all flat-footed. 

Kasuf continued, “I have been informed that it will fall largely to us, the Abydons, to determine your fate after the storm is over, since we are the ones you have attacked. We will consult with our Guardian Team, of course, but it seems they are content to let us be the primary judges.”

Franks lifted an eyebrow at that. “You and what army? We’ve got a thousand soldiers, heavily armed and equipped, to your… what, a few dozen militia? And most of those are out hunting or at the mines. Even with help from other Elpers…”

Kasuf glanced at Jackson, who nodded, looking grim, but let the elder continue to be their spokesman.

“Your numbers are not correct, Team Lead Franks. Apart from the twenty people presently in the Gate Tower, you are all that remain of the Lantean forces. The rest were taken prisoner in culling beams before the storm. They have been… relocated, at a deserted island designated Alpha Site.”

Franks chewed on that unpalatable information. And shut his mouth. 

“I believe the Alpha Site is the location decided for the evacuation of Atlantis, is it not? If you all had to leave the City suddenly, is that not where you were supposed to go? Rather than here to our home?”

Borin, damn her, piped up, “We weren’t informed of any evacuation plans prior to last night, Elder. At least, most of us weren’t. I know the Science Division were nervous about low power levels… but before last night, we all thought we were just doing emergency drills. A specific destination was never mentioned. Not once. Not that anyone thought to ask… it was all just a game. This one went a little further than most, to the extent of actually dematerializing us into buffers… and at that point, we were told our options. Which were none. Well, we could go along with their orders, or… well. That ‘or’ wasn’t actually defined. We weren’t told our destination until they decanted us here, ordered us to clear the town, already empty, and establish guard posts to maintain control. As for the rest of the plan? Most of us had no idea what was going on.”

Kasuf bowed to Jackson.

“Atlantis is approximately one month from total power depletion. The Officer Elite have been aware of the energy problems for generations, and failed to plan for it, or act upon it. The Science Division had an evacuation plan, to pack up everyone and everything and move it to a suitable Alpha Site on an uninhabited island. They highly recommended moving in caches of stores, building shelters and infrastructure in advance. They requested that the FS be dedicated to providing what they would need for survival as a first priority… rather than party clothes and comfy office chairs. Kinsey refused, saying it would only create panic for anyone to know they were planning contingencies. Apparently, Chief Executive Officer Leon Vance liked most of the emergency evacuation plan, except for the destination. Rather than building from scratch, it must have seemed… easier, to take over a town that was already standing. 

“What we would like to know, is what he intended to do with the rightful inhabitants.”

Dorneget gulped, and spilled, the little worm. But he was too far from Franks to get a well-deserved cuff across the back of his head. 

“We were supposed to use our empty culling buffers to search for any Nagadans and sweep them up in the beams. Then we were to deliver them to the Alpha Site. But by the time we arrived, landed and got organized, with our troops decanted and orders given… we couldn’t find anyone. Nothing but a bunch of mastage life signs anywhere in or near town. We weren’t concerned with the people at the mines or out hunting… but they all disappeared too, and we assumed they were hiding out from the storm. They were too far out to be a threat to our operations anyway.”

Jackson peered at Dorneget over his glasses rims. “You knew all this?”

“I overheard. I was pilot for Shuttle 1. The command shuttle. They totally ignored me while they talked over their plans, on the way here.”

Idiots, Franks huffed angrily. He thought better of his Probie. But if it was Vance, Makepeace and David responsible for revealing operational details… he wouldn’t put any kind of errant stupidity past those guys. 

Harry Potter glanced around his circle. “It’s the truth, or as much of it as he knows. Sooo… what were they intending to do with the Abydons? Just leave them stranded on a deserted island? With no supplies, no food, no weapons, no protection from the goa’uld? Not even a half-decent shelter for two thousand people? Or maybe they didn’t intend to let them out of the buffers at all.”

Franks shrugged, and the others didn’t know. “My guess, they figured the other Elpers would take care of all that. If they thought about it at all. Not our problem.”

“And the mastages?” Kasuf asked carefully. 

Franks frowned. “Those big hairy beasts? How would I know? I suppose they must have thought we’d need them. Or would turn them loose… But I don’t know. We have shuttles. What would we need with those things?”

The Abydons, and Jackson, might not have shown much more than mild irritation at the heartless and ruthless way the Lanteans had evidently planned to dispose of the people, but this total disregard for the well-being of their beloved mastages… that infuriated them. Kasuf and Skarra bolted to their feet, swearing in some heathen language of their own, and stalked off to confer with their people. Daniel threw a poisonous look at the prisoners, before joining them. 

Luna shook her head sadly. “They might have forgiven you for everything else, but that was particularly heartless of you, to not care about those poor animals. Whatever mercy they might have been inclined to offer before, you’ve pretty much ruined now.”

Borin cleared her throat, still raspy from sand. “We really didn’t know what their plans were, you know. The Officer Elite have never been… forthcoming. Not to the lower ranks. And it doesn’t look to me like any of them knew what Vance was up to, either. Or they’d be here with the rest of us, trying to pretend they were still in command. And as for Vance… Eli David might have had a part in the planning… Gibbs, maybe, if he cared to ask. Makepeace didn’t know anything much before the rest of us. I’m pretty sure this was all Vance’s show. Ned here may have overheard a few things, but he wouldn’t have had any say in it, even if he tried. 

“As far as any of us knew, last night was just another damn drill, in case of some more or less far-fetched emergency. Maybe it went a little farther than most drills, to the point of actually loading everything and culling pretty much the whole population… but the lousy mood the Captain’s been in since the Inauguration, it wasn’t totally out of line even so. Until all of the SFs were told to line up on the hangar deck and given a choice… obey Vance’s orders and come with him, or be left behind, stranded on a City that was, they told us, going to sink pretty much any day... Did we believe them? I dunno. Maybe some of us did… it all had a loyalty-test smell to it, if you ask me. So we all lined up, and let them cull us. But I swear, that’s *all* we knew, at the time. 

“When they decanted us on the sand out in the landing vale, had us assemble in our squads and teams, and gave us our orders… they didn’t even tell us where we were. We had to guess when we saw all the sand and the town walls. We knew we had practically the whole of Atlantis packed in shuttle cargo bays, and then we were patrolling empty streets and buildings… I’m not saying we’re completely innocent here… if we *had* met any people in our search, we were to take them prisoner and deliver them down the line… and if we had met with any resistance, we’re trained to use deadly force. Trained to face goa’uld hosts with the faces of friends and civilians.

“But… I gotta say… if we have a choice now, when we didn’t have one before? My sense of loyalty to the Officer Elite is dwindling. Fast. They had no right to try and take Abydos. And if I’m gonna be stuck on a desert isle with their lazy asses, I can tell right now how much consideration any of us are going to get when the work load is heavy and the rations are light.”

The Elder, his son and Jackson returned, looking even grimmer than before. The Hogwarts Alphas gave Borin a pretty hard look, and then the rest of them… and Franks knew his own reactions were pretty much crystal clear to them. Even without mind-reading, truth potions, or just plain sentinel senses.

He had known more… had been Gibbs’ confidant, advisor and sounding-board for too many years for the Commander to shut him out of something this big. When he heard the original proposal, it had sounded pretty damn good to him. He knew the Captain and his toadies were fumbling the whole power situation, to the point where they’d all be doomed. He had thought, with Vance’s plan, they stood a good chance of preserving something of their current living standard. And Franks judged the chances of his Probie ending up as Captain had been pretty damn good. He’d back the bastard against Vance or David any day. And that would have left Franks himself in a pretty nice set-up, too. Maybe retirement to a nice little hideaway on a beach, well above the water-mark… one thing Abydos was well-supplied with was sand.

If it had worked. If there hadn’t been a damn storm get in everyone’s way. If Vance, David and Makepeace hadn’t been such damn incompetent idiots. If Borin had had the balls to back him up, and greenie Dorneget hadn’t been such a useless sap. If he had proper back-up when he needed it… he still might have been able to pull his end out and survive this total and complete FUBAR of a mission.

Well. Now they were up the Wazoo River without a paddle, and no mistake. 

Å


	17. Chapter 17: 'Your wish is now our command.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Homage to Sean Connery… we’ll miss ya, laddie…

Å 

Methos and Henry Morgan worked steadily at the controls of the Thermal Power Plant, getting the plug-in connection unit ready to be attached to the Atlantis undercarriage. It seemed to be undamaged, and only the interference of the Wraith could explain why it had never been properly installed into the City power grid. The two Immortals reviewed the instructions in the plant database for using seneschals to do the underwater work that would be necessary… 

Although the small craft (space-worthy and fully submersible) had tractor beams, they weren’t nearly delicate enough for such precise work. However, by extending the ship shields and flushing out the water inside, with one person to pilot, a second could exit the back hatch and do the installation manually. Albeit *very* carefully… so as not to slip and fall right off the wet and slippery hull. Immortal or not, there were more (or less) pleasant ways to die, and it was never fun. Well… almost never. Not to mention there were far too many goa’uld larvae in the ocean, and no one wanted to imagine what one would be able to do with an Immortal host who had a super ATA Gene.

Timing was going to be an issue, however. They were listening in on all the comms, from both the Lanteans at present attempting to occupy Abydos, and the Elper Coalition working to liberate the island. It was clear that nothing was going the Lanteans’ way. Atlantis was sitting practically empty, from all they could tell, just waiting for them to come and take over. Which Ramirez and the MacLeod cousins were determined to do, post-haste. Then they got word from Amanda that she and her sentinel-shaman pair were going to join in… 

The last thing they needed was for the City to be powered up before she was fully secured in the right hands.

Methos sounded a little wistful when he called out, “Are you sure you don’t need us to assist?” Hell, if Henry was any judge, and he was, the oldest Immortal was practically pouting. 

“I think we have it covered, thank you, gentlemen,” Ramirez assured. “There can’t be more than a handful left. We have three seneschals, two full of trained militia and sentinel volunteers here with us… more than enough to deal with this problem.”

“Then we’ll be on our way, too, and ready to engage thermal power as soon as you give the word.” 

At Blair’s request, Cascade’s Jumper Six was now nicknamed ‘Guide’ (because, really, who wanted a numbered craft when they could give it a name and imagine it had a personality of its own?). Henry and Methos packed up their belongings, and a few odds and ends they had salvaged from the plant station, and loaded Guide with the connection unit. Then they placed the power plant on automated function, reporting directly to the City, shut up the hatch, flushed the landing pool and exited into the open sea.

Å 

Don, Tony and Amanda, in Jumper Five, re-named ‘Angel’, after leaving the Alpha Site, had quickly made rendezvous with the rest of the Elper Coalition forces at Port Ath. 

Ramirez, given charge of the operation to recover Atlantis, decided that each Immortal would lead a team, giving him four teams ready to deploy, with support from a minimum of one sentinel-guide pair in each team. For this he had an embarrassment of volunteers ready to assist. Considering the hundreds of militia and sentinel volunteers already assembled for the Elper Coalition mission to liberate Abydos, they would never miss the two dozens he decided to take with him. With Angel, his own Seneschal (as he decided to call her), he only needed one more transport. Jack O’Neill was lending his second-best pilot, Cameron Mitchell, an ATA-B, to fly one of the confiscated Lantean shuttles, which he was dubbing ‘Snakeskinner’. 

When they arrived at the City, they would make contact with the AI, scan for all the remaining personnel on board, and then plan their next moves. It would all depend on how many Lanteans remained behind, who they were, where they were located, how well they were armed, and how resistant to simply surrendering. Each of the Immortals, not to mention Tony, Don and Mitchell, had ATA Genes far stronger than anyone they were liable to meet, so they were sure the City would acknowledge their orders over all others. But even so, no matter how long-lived, or how tied to the City technology, only Don also had sentinel senses, only Tony possessed shaman enhanced empathy, both of which would be invaluable to any invading force. The other Immortals would also need those advantages on their teams.

Don had chosen a sentinel-guide working pair he knew from the LA militia, Colby Granger and Megan Reeves, to join he and Tony behind Amanda. They’d been at the Sanctuary in Rainier, training, for the past month.

The other sentinels had also been in training at Sanctuary when the call for volunteers had gone out. Ramirez had chosen as second an unbonded sentinel named Jonas Quinn, from the small village of Kelowna in Stargate Commune. The young man had been a recent recruit to the Stargate militia, and he was certainly smart enough and enthusiastic enough, but Jack had insisted he go for some intensive training before giving him a weapon of any kind. Ramirez had agreed to take him on, but wanted to keep a newbie close.

Connor MacLeod had picked up Dean Bates and Katie Brown, a working pair from one of the smaller islands in Smuggler’s Reach. His cousin Duncan was teamed up with a bonded pair, also from Stargate Commune, Matthew Scott and Chloe Armstrong. More sentinels gravitated to one or other of the teams, some with bonded partners, some with looser relationships, some, like Quinn, unbonded altogether. 

The teams were rounded out by armed militiamen and women.

Å 

Tony could feel her calling to him, long before the City came into sight. 

‘I’m here, Atlantis. I’m coming home,’ he assured her mentally. 

‘Please hurry…’ was her reply, and a mental wriggle, like that of an excited puppy. 

Amanda threw an amused glance over her shoulder at him from Angel’s co-pilot seat, and he could only shrug. 

It was almost noon over the City’s location when the three jumpers, stuffed with militia, hovered over the shining towers. 

The HUDs all lit up with maps of the City, almost before they were asked, and the heat sensors revealing where everyone was. 

And, at the moment, there were exactly thirty-three of them. Some were gathered in the Captain’s Quarters on the Central Command Tower 56th floor, another group were circulating around the CCT staging deck, while the remaining were on the Central Command Tower Operations Deck mezzanine. A window playing the view from the surveillance system showed almost all of them shouting and arguing with each other. At the moment, it looked as if none of them would even notice the jumpers landing in the Bay above their heads, and if they did, wouldn’t much care. 

Å 

The Chief Judge Advocate General, A.J. Chegwidden, stood behind Operations Tech Chuck Campbell, patting his shoulder in commiseration, since the poor boy was the focus of most of the rage and frustration being spewed by the abandoned Officer Elite. 

AJ’s own staff, JAG officers Harmon ‘Harm’ Rabb Jr. and Sarah ‘Mack’ Mackenzie, were keeping well back, out of the line of fire. Luckily, the officer’s wives, families, and others who had been guests at DiNozzo Senior’s party when the lock-down on the 56th floor went into effect, had remained behind in the Captain’s Quarters. The few lingering on the deck below the mezzanine balcony, watching intently, hadn’t made it onto Leon Vance’s preferential list, and AJ had a good notion why in each case. They were all political rivals of Leon’s, or enemies of Eli David. A couple were both. As for AJ himself, well, he had opted out from the start, hadn’t he? And just as well. He couldn’t see this situation going anywhere but downhill, fast. In a phrase popular among the SF ranks, they were well and truly up the Wazoo River without a paddle, and no mistake. 

It had been hours already, and the same questions were still being asked, the same impossible demands still being made, and no one was listening to Chuck’s repeated explanations of just why he had no ability to recall any of the shuttles, establish communications through an Abydon sandstorm, or alter the surveillance evidence of just how Vance had got the whole City packed up onto shuttles and left them high and dry. He also had to keep repeating that no, there were absolutely no weapons left on the City, unless any of those present had one. No, there were no explosives, either. And yes, there were a few inoperable shuttles left in the berths in the shuttle bay above them, but no, not one could be charged, landed and made ready to fly out because… well, because they were *inoperable*. Repeated requests over the years, from successive Chief Science Officers, to make replacement parts for repairs, had all been denied. Inauguration party clothes had a higher priority, apparently, even over power conservation protocols. 

At last, however, even Kinsey had to get tired of taking it all out on the hapless tech. He took to pacing the mezzanine instead, face red with fury, finally turning on his Officer Elite. 

“Not one of you bastards saw this coming?”

Chief Ordnance Officer Rene Benoit scowled. “Now that it’s been done, I think we can agree we *all* should have expected a move like this. Maybe not from Leon, but certainly from Zelenka and his crowd of Gene Orphans.”

“That’s right,” Chief Logistics Officer Barton Cassidy agreed. “They’ve been yammering for years about the necessity of an evacuation plan. This looks pretty much like what McKay proposed before he left.”

“Hmm, except for one or two important items,” noted Chief Operations Officer Lewis Miller. “For one thing, we were *all* supposed to go. And that proposal would move us to some damn uninhabited island. None of us wanted *that*! But Abydos? Fully built town, accommodations for most of us, harbor, naquadah mines, nothing but a lot of nomad Elpers to deal with… If I had known that option was on the table, even I might have gone along with it.”

AJ straightened up and glared at the other Officer. “Yee-eah,” he drawled, “Except that would be, you know, *illegal*! Not to mention an act of war on a defenseless settlement.”

Chief Procurement Officer Anthony DiNozzo Senior smirked. “Oh, you and your *legalities*… don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the Charter is pretty much null and void at this point. Seems like Leon’s decided to write his own.”

Chief Security Force Officer Philip Davenport, the former JAG, who still held a grudge against AJ for taking the job from him, nodded agreement with DiNozzo. “And it just has one clause… Might makes Right. He’s got all the soldiers, all the weapons, all the shuttles, all the generators, a shield… he’s sitting pretty right now.”

“Unlike us,” muttered an unhappy Chief Education and Training Officer, William Barrett.

AJ shook his head. “You think the Elpers will let this go? You’re dreaming. In fact, *Leon’s* dreaming if he thinks he’ll get away with this.”

That called for more arguments, recriminations and blame among the suddenly impotent Officer Elite. Yesterday, they had been Lords of Novelle, in command of the awesome might of the City of Atlantis. Now? Now they were just a bunch of lame duck guys, waiting for their fate to land on them like a ton of bricks, with no support, no weapons, no semblance of power, of any kind, backing them up. 

AJ took the opportunity to point out a few things he saw on the console in front of Chuck. 

“We’re on minimum power?”

Chuck nodded confirmation. “As soon as the evacuation was complete, she shut down everything she considered nonessential… including the FS, all transporter cabinets but the ones between the 56th floor, and these three top floors. All the other towers, piers and floors are shut down. No lights or heat, no water, no sewage, desalinization has been put on pause, there’s no power going to medical… Local scans only, still primed to detect goa’uld incursions. Even at present power levels, I think she still has enough left to put up a partial barrier against the goa’uld.”

AJ nodded. He had already noted that the City seemed unnaturally quiet… hardly noticeable with the fuss going on around him here in Ops. He was so used to the mild burble bubbling away in the omnipresent blue oxygenation columns, that it was like a blow when they stopped.

Chief Maintenance and Services Officer Noel Keates whined out, “So we just sit here and do nothing? Wait for the goa’uld to overrun us? For the City to topple into the sea? Swim to shore, maybe?” 

Chief Human Resources Officer Jenny Shepard patted him reassuringly. “I’m sure when Vance and David get their control of the Abydons solidified, they’ll send someone back for us. Gibbs will certainly want to bring us back into the fold.” Rumor had it the HR Chief had once had a torrid affair with the Commander… he had been her trainer in ops once upon a time, before he became totally obsessed with the DiNozzo boy. And, reportedly, she still had difficulty believing that. She was, after all, a spectacular red-head beauty, well-practiced in using her feminine wiles to either make men underestimate her, or bow to her wishes. Hence her being the only woman currently in the Officer Elite ranks. “Well, we’ve got Elper trade ships due in any day now. We can catch a lift somewhere with one of them.”

Kinsey gave a shout of supreme ire and said, “We leave this City over my dead body! She’s *ours*!”

“Over your dead body? You really want to put it like that, Robert?” Benoit challenged warningly.

Kinsey firmly ignored that aside. “We still have an FS, we can make our own weapons and explosives, make a shuttle, come to that!”

Tech Chuck cleared his throat. “Er, sir… after recharging the shuttles, the FS doesn’t actually have enough power to make a shuttle from scratch.”

“Okay then! Repair one! There’s a few only need a few replacement parts, I’m sure I read that in Zelenka’s last report. We’ve got enough juice to do that much, surely?”

“Well yes, but…” 

“But? But? What, but?”

The people who had been lingering, pacing, on the staging deck, had ventured up the wide steps to the mezzanine, getting past their own resentment and anger at being deliberately stranded, enough to succumb to curiosity. Having overheard much of the debate, no one giving a damn how loud they were, they were fully apprized of the situation. 

At this point, Intel Officer Trent Kort, second in command of the Intel Unit, but with his eye on Eli’s chair, and not one of the Chief’s favorites, obviously, piped up, “The biggest but, Captain Kinsey, is that not one of us know how the hell to repair a shuttle, even if we do have the parts!”

Chuck gave a ‘what he said’ shrug. 

Incredibly frustrated and building up to a brain aneurism if not a heart attack, Robert Kinsey shouted out yet one more impossible demand. 

“Well? Any of you bastards got any ideas? What are we going to do now?”

Sauntering forward, the only man to run against the Captain in the past three elections, Tom Morrow commented in some amusement, “I thought that was the Captain’s job, to answer that question? Do I detect a failure of leadership there, Robert?”

Kinsey rounded on his primary rival. “Like you could do any better!”

Rene Benoit gave his Captain a jaundiced look, then turned to the other man. “Well, Tom? If you have any grand ideas, now is the time to hear them.”

“Ideas? Me? Why would I have any ideas? A few comments and observations, maybe… like, how the mighty have fallen. How it’s about time. How maybe we should just ask Leon to send someone to pick the rest of us up, and we’ll promise to let him have his way. Because, at this point, we’ve only got two options. Beg Leon to take us in… which, I admit, grates mightily… or call on the Elpers to accept us. Which, fine, might grate even worse, but I bet they’ll be a whole lot easier to live with than Leon and Eli at this point.”

Yeah, AJ was with him there. Yesterday, they had some semblance of a democracy and rule of law on the City… even as corrupt as it was. Today? He wasn’t making book. Leon would be too insecure as the new leader of the Lanteans, especially without the City’s influence behind him, to allow for any hint of rebellion in the ranks. As for Eli David… that guy liked his power and control far too much to ever let it go. Leon had better watch his back with that guy. 

AJ almost missed it, when Chuck nudged him in the hip, staring up at him with wide-open eyes. Glancing down at the monitors, he saw the indicator of the Shuttle Bay hatch opening… and three shuttles landing. Shuttle 35, Shuttle 38, and one unidentified. Unidentified? The in-built life-signs detectors reported a large number of people disembarking… then the monitor went black. Chuck fiddled with a few things, but then shook his head. Whatever command the City had obeyed, it was above his clearance to over-ride. And no one else had noticed.

AJ’s first guess would have been that the incursion was Leon. Sending someone back to collect them. But if the third shuttle was unidentified… who the hell could it possibly be? 

Å 

Ramirez sent a lightning-quick series of commands to the City, and the AI was all too eager to accept them. For one thing, he shut down the surveillance on the seneschal bay, and asked that their life-signs traces be masked and not sent to the Ops Deck consoles. Then he called for a lockdown of the 56th, 68th, 69th floors and seneschal bay on 70, to be released only on his command, or that of the other three Immortals leading teams with him. 

He sent Amanda and her team to the 56th floor to collect the non-combatants down there, and bring them back to the bay. They had a culling buffer there to collect their prisoners. That was the safest way to keep them all on ice while they took over the City and all her functions. 

He, Connor and Duncan would take their teams to make three separate entries to the Ops and staging decks: one transporter cabinet on the *Astrea Porta* level, the other two on the mezzanine floor just above. 

With no sentries posted (apparently they had no sentries to post) and no one paying attention (except for AJ and Chuck), it was child’s play to move in and corral everyone still wrangling away in Ops.

“Enough!” Ramirez roared out, as his forces circled the shocked and hysterical people. “Surrender, now, or we will take appropriate measures!”

It wasn’t resistance, as such, just noise and confusion. And not helping, at all. The few in this crowd of idiots he identified as potential threats, Trent Kort, Chegwidden and his two officers in particular, immediately took stock of the situation and fell to their knees, hands laced behind their heads. With a nod, he sent a sentinel to secure and search all four. Kort had several concealed knives and a zat on him, but the others were clean. 

When Kinsey and several others attempted to get up in his face, Ramirez dealt with them himself, before any of his people could assist. A few sharp moves, and five more were thrown onto their backs, groaning, or gasping out their pain as they collapsed to their knees. After that, the rest slowly matched the proper attitude of their JAG Officer. 

“Now,” Ramirez declared, “I’m going to tell you how this is going to go. You are all going to stay right where you are, still and quiet as mice, until we’re ready to deal with you. And that means putting you in a culling buffer to be relocated to Alpha Site. That’s where the rest of your people will be waiting for you. At present, we have all but twenty secured. And those last twenty will be in hand as soon as the Abydon sand-storm subsides. Are we clear?”

The tall Immortal didn’t wait for replies, but, with a mocking, sarcastic smirk at their shock, he inquired, “Any questions?”

That was the disaster Ramirez had expected of these delusional puffed-up politicos. It would take far more time than they had for most of them to accept how perfectly and completely screwed they all were. 

The exceptions were notable. 

AJ cast a despairing and resigned glance at his Officer Elite cohorts. 

When Ramirez again shouted for silence, and had to cuff a couple of people to get them to submit, AJ finally had the opportunity to put a few questions of his own.

“I take it that Vance’s bid to take over Abydos failed?”

Unwillingly, the others all fell silent, eyes and mouths agape, to hear the answer.

“Resoundingly, yes. He hadn’t counted on dropping into the middle of a sand-storm. He made no allowance for the Abydons being ready and well-drilled for emergencies of all kinds. They were forewarned and already hidden in safety when Vance began his assault, on an apparently empty town. And he also underestimated the anger of the entire Elper community for such an atrocity to be perpetrated against them. They’re all a bit… miffed.”

No kidding, AJ thought, drily. And just about what Leon should have expected, the asshole. 

“So what can we expect to happen once we get to the Alpha Site?”

Ramirez smirked at him. “You’re AJ Chegwidden, the JAG, correct? Yes, this lot is going to need a good lawyer. Just so you know, the Alpha Primes and all the Alpha Guardians have decided that the Lanteans have completely trashed the Charter, so it is now null and void. They are also in unanimous agreement that with the degree of mismanagement you have shown for the resources of Atlantis, that none of you can be trusted at the controls of the City. I don’t know if you’re aware, but she does not like any of you very much. She wants you all gone, and we intend to do whatever is necessary to make her happy again. 

“However, the Alphas are not without some compassion. Unlike yourselves. Once we have you all on the Alpha Site, each of you will be given a choice of where you wish to go, and what you wish to do. Those choices are not going to be entirely limitless… more of a multiple choice. You can choose to stay on Alpha Island, and build your own little empire any way you wish. I expect you know that means you will be building from scratch, as there’s nothing there at present. Or you can petition to join an established colony elsewhere. Whether they will accept you will depend entirely upon what their Alpha Sentinels and Shamans decide. And they’re not looking very kindly on the Officer Elite at this moment, either. 

“Myself, I would have insisted on punishments, meted out to those who planned and executed an armed insurrection and invasion of a defenseless settlement. But it was not my decision. I think the Guardians consider exile to Alpha Island to be enough punishment. Now, none of you were *actually* engaged in attempted invasion, or even complicit, since your people appear to have abandoned you to your own devices. What you choose to do with mutineers is up to you. But I doubt anyone we send to Alpha, or who elect to stay there, will be feeling that their leadership has done well by them.”

AJ nodded, admitting that was a fair point. “So the Gene Orphans…”

“Will all have the option to return to their families and homes. Yes. Again, depending upon whether their Alpha Sentinels and Shamans will accept them.”

“What kind of supplies and support can we expect for building a settlement on this Alpha Island?”

“Food, clothing, personal possessions… of course you’ll get all that. Not that the food will last long unless you find ways to gather or grow it yourselves. I suppose they’ll let you have enough for survival. If you’re thinking seneschals… shuttles, or weapons more than handguns and knives, you can probably forget about that. There’s absolutely no chance that the Elper Coalition will permit you anything that might enable you to invade another settlement. You’ll be offered a means to call for help… in case of emergency, or goa’uld hosting. But, I wonder, do you happen to recall how… unhelpful your security forces have been in the past, when Elpers called for assistance? Yeah, you might want to think about that.”

AJ sighed and gave a nod. Times were about to get very tough for the Lanteans… not unlike the situation the Elper refugees all faced in the early days after Landing. 

“And with no Charter in place… what future trade opportunities will be offered to us?” He was thinking the food situation would become critical pretty damn quickly, unless they had some kind of deliveries made.

Ramirez shrugged. “You make your own deals there. With anyone who thinks it safe enough to approach you, which I would guess would be very few, especially after the Abydos attack. Or anyone who thinks you can be trusted to keep to a contract, which is probably an even smaller number. Or anyone who thinks you might have something worth trading for. Can’t see that there’s much, myself… And persuading anyone of all three of those conditions is entirely up to you. No Charter is going to *make* anyone serve you any longer.”

Oh, that was becoming crystal clear. But then, even without Leon Vance’s criminal action in attacking Abydos, this was always how the situation was going to play out, once the City power cells were completely depleted. What goes around comes around… and karma had definitely caught up with the Lantean Officer Elite.

It was time for AJ to wonder if his cousins in the Pastureland town of DeeCee would have him back…

Å 

It was all oddly anticlimactic, once the Lantean Officer Elite had surrendered. Maybe not peacefully, more like loudly, with much stomping of feet and gnashing of teeth, like petulant toddlers, but still, without loss of life or injury, on either side. 

Tony called it a win when he hadn’t even had to face his father. Given the chance, he would never have to look that man in the face ever again. A sentinel had come to claim the buffer, loaded with the Officer Elite wives and party guests they had found in the Captain’s Quarters, and taken it up to Ops to sweep up the last of the Lanteans. 

Then, with Ramirez at the Ops control consoles, he had called to the waiting Guide to give Methos and Henry Morgan the go ahead to insert the thermal power plant connection unit into the City power grid, and activate…

The silence on the City had been deafening, with most of her functions shut down for power conservation when there had been only a minimal crew on board, and no one with sufficient Gene control authority. The dark, cold corridors and towers had been spooky and haunted by creaking, settling, and the gentle sway of the floating City on the ocean waves, usually barely noticeable. 

Then, with the flick of a single switch… it all began to come alive once more. The power flooded through once-dead conduits, beginning to fill the empty back-up battery cells. Slowly at first, but gaining momentum, minute by minute. 

Guide landed in the bay, and Methos and Henry joined their friends in Ops. 

Slowly, function by function, system by system, tower by tower and floor by floor… 

The Oldest Immortal took over the Ops command console. He advised the City that there were still towers that could be left sleeping with the bare minimum of power, until more critical systems were fully engaged. He requested a list of priority repairs the City had wanted to be addressed, that had been ignored, some since Landing. At the top, as he hoped, was the long range scanner system. He would ask for tech and scientist volunteers to return to make a start on repairs, as soon as they were available. Rodney, Carter, Zelenka, Eppes and Reid, for a start, as soon as they had cleared up the mess from the Lanteans on Abydos, and the upcoming confrontations on Alpha Site. 

He asked the City AI flat out if she had anything on that list she felt couldn’t wait... 

Almost sighing with relief through her oxygenation columns, the City replied, ‘Yes, there is one thing that must be addressed. Tony will need to see to it. As soon as he is able.’

That startled Methos a little. The newest shaman seemed a little… reserved, to him. He had heard the history of that young man, understood the damage that had been done to him, had heard Amanda give her opinion that he was exceptionally resilient and in a fair way to recovering… but what could the young man be able to do that one of the others among them couldn’t, when they all had the strongest expression of the Ancient Tech Activation Genes? 

‘Ah well. If that’s what you wish, sweetheart, that is what you will get. As it should have been all along. Your wish is now our command.’ 

Å


	18. Chapter 18: There must always be room for mercy.

Å 

No one had any idea what it was Atlantis needed Tony to do, but Amanda and Don both insisted that they would have to be included in whatever it was. Amanda with her sword and heavy personal rifle slung over her shoulder, and Don armed to the teeth, there wasn’t much the two of them couldn’t handle. 

Tony could certainly understand why Don insisted on keeping as close to him as possible… whatever their personal relationship was, or might become, Don was a sentinel to his marrow, and hard-wired to protect any shaman or guide. But the fact that Amanda had decided that she needed to keep an eye on them both… well, that mystified him a little. She seemed to have assigned herself as their chaperone, occasionally making dry comments about how much trouble boys, like the MacLeods, could get into, without proper supervision. And she had plenty of experience, thanks to the aforesaid MacLeods. 

Tony kept a wry smirk to himself, because he was fairly sure that if there was any threat involved in this task, Atlantis would certainly have warned him… and he could probably drop it in its tracks before either of his guards lifted and aimed their weapons. 

He hadn’t practiced on actual people yet, apart from that first reflexive defense at the Inauguration, but he was pretty sure that his ‘stun them with shamany goodness’ ability, as Willow Rosenberg referred to it, was far more effective than any weapon. He had studied it in quiet moments, looking within during meditation, and pulling it out to examine on the Spirit Plain, and he and Blair both thought he was in pretty good control of it. 

So Tony had no issues trotting out of the transport cabinet into the bottom thirtieth-floor sub-basement of Tower seven, Souwest Pier. 

The walls were, unexpectedly, all transparent down this deep. Not glass, couldn’t be glass at this depth and pressure, and still be clear, and very little light from the surface penetrated this far down. Still, there were dim flashes off fish scales moving in the gloom beyond the widows.

But ranged around the central column, with the stairwell, transport cabinet, plumbing and sewage facilities, were a circle of tube-shaped cells, each big enough to hold a person. 

Amanda gasped. “Stasis pods! What, are there… twenty of them? Look and see if there’s anyone in any of them.”

Amanda went one way, the two men went the other. It was Amanda who reached it first, and called the others. 

Inside just the one cell was a woman. Tall, black hair, pale skin, eyes closed. She was dressed in leather… not a lot of leather, but strategically placed. Oddly, her thigh-high black leather boots held more material than the rest of her costume together. Don and Tony exchanged glances and heavy gulps, with difficulty restraining their purely male reactions. She might not be classically beautiful, but she was certainly arresting in appearance. No man would ever forget her.

The pilot Ramirez had brought with him from Sanctuary, a Stargate Commune militia leader named Cameron Mitchell, arrived through the transport cabinet, and called out, “Yo! Folks! We got the FS system up and turning out lunches up in the Central Tower Fifth floor… turned that big open space into a mess hall. Apart from them, the factory in the Central basement that’s under Immortal control now, and the infirmary hatches, all the other FS units are shut down… Thought I’d bring you some lunch and coffee... Oh! What the hell! Where did you find her?”

Amanda and the three very attractive young men sat and contemplated the occupied cell as they worked through the food and drinks Cameron had brought. 

Amanda reported, “According to the control panel on that cell, she was stuck in there just after Landing. She doesn’t have an ATA Gene. In fact… I have a feeling she might not be human. At least, not Earth-human. It says they ‘found’ her, in space, rescued her from a ship that was broken down and leaking air. But once they landed on Novelle, she was one of the first victims to a goa’uld hosting. They didn’t know how to get her free, so they put her in there… and then left her.”

“Ouch. Cold,” Mitchell commented. 

Tony put his head on one side. “If she was one of the first, they wouldn’t have even known what the goa’uld were, much less what to do with one. Then they were all pretty busy in the early days just surviving… and then they closed down all but the Central Command Tower and the South Pier… I’d guess they must have forgot she was even in here?” he asked the AI. 

They could all hear, ‘That assumption is correct. I have frequently tried to inform the authorities that she is awaiting release, to no avail. And even I had higher priority issues that needed to be addressed. Now, however, with Tony as an emerged shaman, we have the means to set Vala Mal Doran free.’

“Hunh,” Cameron grunted as he leaned over to peer at the controls on the stasis cell side panel. He reached out and pressed a red button… 

“Whoa!” Don shouted out. 

“Stop!” Tony yelped at the same time.

Amanda merely sighed. “Boys, boys, boys. You’re all alike, aren’t you? Can’t keep your bloody fingers out of a light socket. Well, let’s get her out then, and see what we’ve got.”

“What’s the problem, anyway?” Cameron asked, mystified. “You’re a shaman, right, Tony? You can get that parasite out of her, right?”

Tony shook his head. “Not just by myself, I can’t. I need some very specific herbs and drugs, and I don’t know if any were left on the City when Vance evacuated. I know I don’t have any with me in my pack.”

‘I can supply sufficient quantities of the required drugs from the medical bay hatch,’ Atlantis offered helpfully. 

Tony sighed in relief. ‘That will be a help, thanks.’ 

But that still meant dealing with an angry goa’uld as soon as the door to the stasis cell lifted away. Her last memory would have been dozens of Lantean hands wrestling her into the thing and slamming shut the door. 

“I am Qetesh! I am Goddess! You will obey me and kneel before me, insolent mortals!”

“Insolent *Immortal*, if you please,” Amanda corrected with a grin, and zatted her to the floor. “Next stop medical bay, then?”

Å 

Tony collapsed in a handy chair, leaning his head back, eyes shut closed, waiting for the exhaustion and nausea to pass. Once again, his stomach felt ready to heave if he only opened his eyes… Don passed him a hot cup of soothing tea that worked to settle his internal butterflies. 

Cameron had gleefully taken care of ‘Qetesh’, a queen goa’uld, daughter of Hathor herself. Which actually answered one of their questions. Just how old *was* Hathor? Well past two hundred years old, apparently, since she pre-dated Landing. But Qetesh had been young, Vala Mal Doran her first host… and had been unaware, before taking over, what humans were. By the time she had realized the advantages of clinging to the woman, they had already been thrust into stasis. 

Hopefully, her very brief possession would enable the woman to recover from her ordeal all the faster. Because Qetesh had been a queen, even though her tenancy was brief, the residual healing ability of the parasite had made the severity of the exit wound minimal. 

Having nothing better to do at the moment, Amanda and the boys took seats ranged around the woman’s bed, waiting for her to rouse from the sedative. 

Cameron seemed a bit nervy. “How long do you think the sand-storm is going to last on Abydos? ‘Cause, you know, the sooner we get all those damn Lanteans relocated on their new little island home, the better I’ll feel about it. Makes me antsy, just thinking of any of them still out and loose, able to cause trouble.”

Don cocked an eyebrow at the younger man. “At this point, we’re talking about twenty still out and loose, as you say, and they’re all of them trapped in a sentry tower while the storm lasts. There’s a handful stuck down in the catacombs with pretty much the whole town of Nagada watching them. But ya know, only one of them has enough of a Gene to fly a jumper out of there. So I wouldn’t worry about them.”

Cameron shifted again. “Yeah, okay, I hear ya, but… still gonna feel antsy till we get them all on that island and out of our hair.”

Amanda gave an enigmatic smile. “I’d be more worried over the delay in getting the Atlantis repairs completed, if I were you, Cammie. Did you hear what we found in the thermal power plant?”

Cameron stared. “You mean that was true? There was actual Wraith there! Honest to Powers Wraith?”

“Oh yeah. We really need that long-range scanner system to be up and running, soonest.”

“I’ll say,” mumbled a vague voice from the bed. “Wow. What hit me? Those are obviously the *good* drugs…”

“Hush,” Amanda recommended. “You’ve had a bit of a shock to the system… and I’m afraid you’ve got a few more coming. You’ve been in a stasis pod for over two hundred years.”

Dark blue eyes widened and blinked. “The hell you say!”

“Yeah, there’s been some... history. Don’t worry about it now, though. Not really applicable to your situation, except to explain why there’s no one here you recognise. You know what the goa’uld are?”

“What, those disgusting eel things they have on this planet? Yeah… there were a few… accidents. Hostile little bastards, once they took control. Didn’t give anyone much of a choice but to shoot ‘em dead… Then… none of the other hosts survived the experience… I take it I did?”

“With help,” and Amanda nodded toward Tony, who smiled shyly and gave a wave. 

“Well then… I guess I have to say thank you… and… it’s about bloody time you got here!” 

Levering herself up to sit, the woman focused her still-bleary vision on Tony. Then Don, and then Cameron. “But, I forgive you, on account of all the eye candy.” She turned back to Tony, checking him out with sparkling dark blue eyes and enough wattage in her smile to power the City for a year. “Hel-lo, beautiful!” 

Amanda laughed, and laughed even harder as Tony blushed and smiled shyly, with Don restraining himself brutally, only giving a huff of annoyance. 

“Oh, honey, we’re going to be *great* friends, you and I! Sisters under the skin, obviously. I’m Amanda, by the way, and my young friends here are Cameron Mitchell, Tony DiNozzo your savior, and the snarky one here is Don Eppes. I’m currently playing chaperone for the boys, but you know, I need all the help I can get… you game?”

“To watch over these lads? Oh yes,” the woman volunteered enthusiastically, a decided and appreciative gleam in her eye, and at the same time offering a hand to shake with the Immortal. “Vala Mal Doran, by the way. Pleased to meet you.”

Amanda’s smile only grew. “Oh, honey, *nicely* done… but you can give it back now.”

Vala’s dark blue eyes widened in innocent confusion. “Pardon me? Give what back?”

“My ring. It’s not worth much anyway, merely of sentimental value. Come on, I saw you palm it. Went right down your very impressive cleavage there. Or do you want me to dig for it?” 

With a sigh and a scowl, Vala stuck a hand down between her breasts and into the black leather bustier. “No need. Damn. I haven’t been caught so flat footed since… Hey, wait a minute! My bracelet! Where is it?”

With a chuckle, Amanda dangled the gold chain in front of the other woman’s eyes. When Vala reached, Amanda snatched it back. “Unh Unh. Not until you return the ring. I didn’t forget that it’s still in your hand.”

Somewhat shocked, the three men stared, heads swinging back and forth between the two women like spectators at a tennis match. 

Hostages were duly exchanged, and the women studied each other with new-found respect. 

Then Vala sighed glumly. “I didn’t catch you, but you certainly caught me. I can’t believe I’m so out-classed. That has never happened to me before, I’ll have you know, not since I was an apprentice thief of six years old, learning how to get the better of a bell vest.” 

Amanda merely grinned. “We’ll have to trade stories soon.” Then she reassured, “I have certain advantages of age and experience, and you’ve been in stasis for over two hundred years. I expect you’re just a little rusty. Don’t worry about it.” 

As far as Cameron and Don were concerned, that was cause for even greater alarm. But Tony just began to giggle, then guffaw, and it was possibly the first truly free and easy laughter he had ever known.

Å 

It took a little over a ten-day for the sand-storm on Abydos to blow itself out. 

As soon as the weather had cleared even a minimal amount, anyone with enough of a Gene, Elper or Gene Orphan, arrived from Port Ath on Jumper One to dig down to the buried Lantean shuttle fleet, and begin ferrying all of the confiscated vessels away to the Alpha Site. That hadn’t taken long. 

Radek Zelenka was in charge of off-loading cargo from the shuttles, double checking inventory lists to make sure nothing was left that shouldn’t be, anything that might pose a potential problem later, or anything that properly belonged to the City. The Lantean share of the evacuation supplies were piled in that one handy cavern for protection. 

The culling buffers were devices that fell under the heading ‘might pose a problem later’, so only those containing people, waiting to have their fates decided, were to be left behind. Those containing anything inanimate were emptied, their contents re-materialized in the cavern, checked to make sure the inventories were accurate. A certain number of buffers contained livestock – goats, chickens, cattle, whatever the Maintenance and Service Division had kept penned on the City – and these were left as they were, until there was someone to care for them. The Elpers would decant them later and take those buffers with them as well.

A careful inventory was made of all that they were leaving here. Food and medical supplies of course, enough to set up and stock an infirmary. Heavy machinery equipment, some medical, some for building, some for farming. Datapad tablets and a server unit for a computer network. Some scientific instruments for surveying and surveillance on their shores, and of course, life signs detectors. Several small naquadah generators were left, enough to serve a population double what they thought Alpha would eventually have. A few small shield domes were left, with their own power generators, for protection. The exiles would need that, while they built more sustainable defenses. Only hand weapons were supplied, and only enough to arm the SFs they might have. Nothing more than was absolutely required for survival and defense. That was it, apart from clothing and assorted sundries. 

The buffers containing people were all clearly marked and placed in a separate temporary shed built under a mini-dome for shelter and security. It was no part of anyone’s plan to allow the Goa’uld to take advantage of the situation, to gain themselves a foothold on Novelle. Even of the former Lanteans.

Once the emptied buffers were collected and packed up, all but one of the jumpers were flown away. ‘Scooby’ would remain, still, with Xander Harris, Rupert Giles, and the Hellmouth militia to stand guard. A few with cargo to be returned to Atlantis flew first to the City, the rest directly back to Cheyenne. Later they would be divided up between the City and the various Elper provinces. There would be no chance of the Lanteans getting their hands on even one means of escape from their exile island. 

If they wanted off bad enough, they would just have to build themselves a ship, and sail away. 

Å 

The first to emerge into the light of a new Abydon day were the Abydons themselves, leaving their catacomb bunkers. They knew the ways of their island best, and when it was safe for them to return to their homes and work. This time, they had escorts of militia volunteers, all under the command of the Alpha Sentinels of the Elper Coalition. The Lantean invaders had been contained, those held in the catacombs taken away in restraints, but their Guardian Alpha, John Sheppard, was unwilling to take any chances, and neither was their favorite son, Daniel Jackson. As it was, the few sections of Nagada the Lanteans had occupied required clean up and repair. 

The Alphas themselves led the main part of their hastily-organized force to the Gate Tower. As soon as the twenty people inside peeked out of the shuttered windows and realized what they faced, surrounding their Tower, they shut up all access again. It was going to be an old-fashioned siege. But the defenders were already low on food…

It took two days for Leon and Eli to bow to the inevitable, at the irritated urging of Makepeace and Gibbs.

Once again, the surrender of the Lanteans was relatively peaceful and anti-climactic. It seemed they had no stomach for a fight that so heavily favored a side not their own.

Å 

The careful construction of the Court Venue on the Alpha Site Island for their Lantean Tribunal, actually took longer than the efforts to liberate Abydos from its invaders. 

Committees and consultations were undertaken to decide who would attend, either as witness, jury or audience, and how to go about processing the trials of some, and the determination of who would be located where. Certainly, the entire proceedings would be filmed for posterity. No one wanted there to be any questions, now or in the future, about fairness or justice, when all was said and done.

A sheltered vale was found in the center of the island, a natural amphitheater in shape. Bleachers were built up the side of the hill, of cut stone blocks and wooden benches, seating for a full five thousand, in serried rows up the hillside and divided into sections that could be easily sealed off under separate shield domes. At the bottom of the hill, a series of flat wooden-plank platforms were built in a circle around the level bottom of the hollow, with the largest, a witness box, in the center. Each platform was supplied with its own benches, some with desks, and each had their own protective shield domes, to prevent… accidents. One platform was for the Guardian Alphas, designated judges in this matter, to be seated along a table set to the forefront. 

Opposite was one where the Lanteans could seat those who would represent them, also with desks. It was felt by everyone that the Lantean leadership had the duty to be present for the entire proceedings, so they would have their own bubble platform. They would be decanted from their culling buffers first, and allowed to speak to each newly made refugee if they so wished, put their case for the people to choose to remain on Alpha Site. As long as they behaved themselves, they could remain during the entire process. If not, they could be placed on another of the ready platforms.

Groups would be taken a few at a time, to be questioned, assessed, and a determination to be made of their fate. Once the process was completed for each group, they would be sent to the hillside bleachers to watch the ongoing court drama. It was important to the Elper Coalition leaders that the Lanteans, all of them, should witness justice being done, and have some say, with the right to defend themselves, or make what choices they could, or were allowed.

Once the Tribunal process was complete, the Lanteans would be left with the shield domes, run off provided small generators, to set up and use any way they wished. Until they had some shelters constructed for the people, they would need the protection. There were children to consider, after all. 

The common people of Atlantis were probably totally unaware that they had been tricked into participating in Leon’s little coup. What would their reactions be? Then there were the military members of the Security Force Division. Many had been actively complicit in the attack on Abydos. Although Kasuf and Daniel Jackson had hesitantly suggested some had been more enthusiastic in their commitment than others, and some had felt they had no choice but to obey… yeah, determining degrees of guilt was going to be a complication for sure. That was going to be a whole other headache, for the sentinels to sniff out truth from lies, for shamans to feel for heart-felt repentance. 

Would the rank and file still be so prejudiced against Elpers that they would chose to remain with their leaders, no matter how thoroughly they had been betrayed by them? Either by being made victims in Leon’s failed insurrection, or through the short-sightedness, entitlement, greedy corruption and sheer blind willful denial of the Captain and Officer Elite? Perhaps they wouldn’t even believe they were permanently locked out of the City they had so long taken for granted was theirs, and theirs alone. 

In any event, those who chose to abandon ship for a life among the Elpers had better be able to pass the test of the Alpha Sentinels and Shamans, that their change in loyalty was sincere. Likewise, those who chose to remain behind, had also better be sincere in their decision, not ordered, threatened, coerced or extorted by anyone.

Those who had been part of Radek Zelenka’s escape plan had already been questioned by sentinels and alphas, determined to be honest and truthful, and genuine in their desires to return home to their families and original homes. Those family members in their culling buffers, spouses, first generation adults and children, had been decanted and also interviewed. Not one had objected to the idea of escaping from the Lanteans and living among their Elper relatives. Most had already been flown by jumper to their various settlements, and long-awaited and almost-despaired-of reunions had gleefully and tearfully taken place. 

The supplies Zelenka had apportioned as their share in the evacuation, was divided again. Food, medical supplies, personal weapons, were packaged and sent with them to their clans. Explosives and military hardware of any sort were sent to Sanctuary, to be re-distributed later. Likewise the generators and other miscellaneous equipment. Some might just be sent back to Atlantis, and probably should never have left the City. The jumpers were likewise an issue to be determined later. Most would no doubt be returned to the City, but each province would probably get a few for their own use. Smuggler’s Reach, in particular, had a need for more jumpers to adequately cover their wide-spread and isolated island communities. 

It was yet to be determined what purpose the City of Atlantis would serve in the future, and who, and how, it would be staffed. But that would come later. John Sheppard had already submitted his claim to be named Guardian of Atlantis, as both one of the strongest Gene carriers, and since the floating City was, technically, another ‘island’ in the Carib Chain. 

Which left the Lanteans. 

Å 

The Court Venue, in the deep vale in the middle of the Alpha Site Island, was ready and waiting. Plentiful armed militia, volunteers from dozens of communities, many of them sentinels or guides, were on hand to search and disarm, and to keep the peace, to ensure the orderly progress of the proceedings. A few of them had ATA Genes, strong enough to manipulate portals in each dome, for ushering captives from one to another. If events tuned difficult, there were culling buffers to separate those who would be allowed to leave, from those who… weren’t.

On the Elper Coalition side, the first and most prominent platform, held the Guardians. Alpha Primes Ellison and Sandburg took the center of their long table, with the Smuggler’s Reach Alphas, Sheppard and McKay next to them. The other Alphas ranged to either side. Kasuf and Skarra, as their community had been especially abused, had been promised a say in what was decided for the attackers. They sat between Daniel and O’Neill. LA, the only province without a Guardian Alpha pair, were represented by their Councilors, Lange, Granger and Eppes, with sentinel Edgerton at their back. In a center section of the bleachers behind, other interested parties were permitted a seat, if they wished. Many of the province councils sent representatives. There were plenty of empty benches in this open section, awaiting the results of sorting. 

The arrangement was, oddly enough, not unlike the Inauguration ceremony they had all attended not so long ago… only with the positions of podium and attendees reversed. 

Tony had been offered a place… and was torn. Much as he never wanted to face his father or any of his ‘wives’, much less Gibbs… the chance to meet his kids for the first time… he overcame his doubts and apprehension, because that was something he had desperately wanted for a very long time.

Not surprisingly, Don and Amanda insisted on joining him. For moral support if nothing else. What was a surprise was that Vala had invited herself along… and with her, her new ‘adornment’, Cameron Mitchell, who had a tendency to drool around the self-described lady space pirate. 

As with everything, Vala took her seat like she owned the world, leaned back and stretched out her long, shapely legs, fetchingly sheathed in black leather. She looked about her, quite satisfied with the warm sunny weather, pleasant view and green hills all around them. But she frowned a little at all the empty seats ranged up the hill behind them. 

“What’s with all the benches? You can fit thousands in this place. But I thought the idea was to question them little groups at a time.”

Amanda pointed out, “If you’ll notice, each block has its own shield, to keep everyone in place. The Alphas think it’s important everyone be witness to this. Transparency, they call it. They want *all* the Lanteans to know why they’re here, and why they’re being judged, and to see that there’s no back-room deals or secrecy going on.” 

“Ah. Not sure they deserve the consideration, from all I’ve heard. You know, even in my day, your Lanteans were assholes who deserved to get their butts kicked. I wasn’t with them more than a few days before I decided I’d had enough of their grandiose entitlement. I was just waiting for an opportune time to make my exit. Which wasn’t until they managed to land the City… I planned on stealing one of those adorable little space shuttles, load it to the gills with booty, and make my way out through the *chaapa’ai*.”

The three men frowned. “*Chaapa’ai*?” Cameron asked.

“*Astrea Porta*? Stargate? Big round thing in the lower Ops deck?”

Amanda was amused. “You’re familiar with the Stargate?”

“Well, of course. My only problem was trying to over-ride the lock they had on it, sealing it shut against the Wraith. Well, that, and I needed a willing patsy who could actually fly one of the shuttles… I was working on those issues when I had my little run in with the eel-thing… Qetesh the goa’uld queen. May she rot in hell for all eternity.”

In paying attention to Vala Mal Doran, their little group missed the moment when the first batch of Lanteans were re-materialized in the center witness box of the Court Venue, the largest of the platforms. 

These were the surrenders from the City, those abandoned by Leon and his cohorts in their failed coup. They weren’t guilty of any crime, as such, except for being entitled assholes in deep denial, and perhaps criminally negligent in their treatment of the City. That didn’t mean they were ever going to be allowed to return to her. There was some shouting and protests when they found themselves trapped behind a force-field dome, until Sandburg, Alpha Prime Shaman of Novelle, lost his formidable cool. 

“Enough! In case it hasn’t yet penetrated those grandiose, entitled minds of yours,” he shouted, and Vala chuckled, “your situation is extremely precarious! You hold absolutely no power here. No influence. What happens to you from here on out depends entirely on our good will, and you don’t have a lot of that to begin with. Care to erode it further? That’s your choice. But I believe wiser heads would advise you to shut your mouths, wait to be offered your say, and behave yourselves!” 

Sullenly, resentfully, first the Captain, then one by one, the members of his Officer Elite, reluctantly took their seats. Last of all was AJ Chegwidden, their JAG, smirking a little at his erstwhile cohorts. 

Sandburg shook himself and stretched his neck to relieve a certain amount of tension, his neck-bones cracking unpleasantly, to make his sentinel partner wince. Then he said, in a much milder tone, “Mr. Chegwidden, would you and your assistants agree to act as counsel for the Lanteans? Not just for the Officer Elite and those who attacked Abydos, but for everyone. They should all have proper representation in these proceedings.”

AJ took a moment to consider, glancing at his staff, Harm and Mack. Mack nodded and Harm merely shrugged acceptance. Then, with a sigh, AJ agreed. “I have one stipulation to make, however.”

“Of course you do,” Ellison muttered. “You’re a damn lawyer.”

Sandburg ignored his mate. “And that would be?”

“I respectfully request that we, me and my two staff, be the last to face judgment, and put our case for ourselves. Oh, and I’ll need the assistance of Harm and Mack for a job of this magnitude and importance.”

Sandburg considered, glanced at his fellow Alpha Shamans. This kind of thing, legal proceedings of any kind, highly annoyed and irritated sentinels, so they had pushed their shaman mates into the leading role here. They could ascertain truth, but let their shamans judge worthiness, or lack thereof. That was a shaman’s purpose, after all, seeing into the heart and soul of someone. Blair got nods from his fellow shamans. “That is acceptable to us.”

With the assistance of a militia sentinel with a strong ATA Gene, and therefore able to open portals in the domes, AJ, Harm and Mack were released from the witness platform and re-seated on the platform designated for the counsel, facing the judges on their own platform.

Looking over the Officer Elite, all but Leon and Makepeace, of course, AJ asked, “What options are we being offered?”

“For Captain Kinsey and his Elite Officers? None,” Jack O’Neill replied, rubbing at his ear, as if someone, or something, were shouting into it. “The City of Atlantis has requested that none of you be permitted to return to her. Ever, under any circumstances. She says none of you ever listened to her, none of you cared a damn what she needed or wanted. Repeated warnings to conserve energy or locate and establish connection with her thermal power plant were ignored. You would have let her sink into the sea, if it had been up to you. Worse, you didn’t care about *any* of her people. Not just the Elpers, whom she considers her responsibility every bit as much as you are, but any of the Lanteans. The proof of this was your failure to plan and refusal to prepare for the safe evacuation of the people in the event of total power loss, which you all knew was coming, and coming soon. That Leon Vance took matters into his own hands is the only reason the City is still floating right now.”

Sandburg said, “This Alpha Site Island was thoroughly surveyed, studied, and chosen as the best option for an evacuation site and secondary Lantean colony. It has the necessary resources to provide for survival, room for growth, a place you may even thrive, if you’re willing to work for it, to put in the required infrastructure. The fact you never bothered to even begin to build temporary shelters for emergencies… well. That was your choice. So now, we’re not giving you any other option. You stay here, and make what you can of the place. You certainly won’t be given the opportunity to try and take over any inhabited settlement or outpost. You have an alternate uninhabited island you’d rather take over? Fine. We’ll listen.”

When it looked like the Captain was going to work up a head of steam, AJ quickly intervened. “There is no better option for a colony, Kinsey! You know it. McKay, Reid, Zelenka, they all vetted it, all searched hundreds of islands just like it, and determined this was the best place. They won’t let you back on the City, they won’t let you move to an established community… It’s this or nothing, and even you can’t choose nothing.”

“Listen to the man,” Benoit advised, sour, but bending to the inevitable. As did the others on the witness platform. 

“Very well. This island will have to do,” Kinsey grudgingly accepted. “But its name will be New Lantea.”

“Better than Kinsinea,” Tom Morrow muttered, pitched to carry.

Beside him, his own voice no less quiet, Steven Caldwell gave a jaundiced huff. “No, that’ll be the capitol city.” 

Å 

At AJ’s recommendation, just Benoit, Davenport and Chief HR Officer Jenny Shepard joined he and his staff on the counselors’ platform as Lantean representatives. They were the most level heads of the bunch, certainly the brightest, and the best able to put their cases. 

Kinsey and the rest of the Officers were removed to a third platform, specially set aside for the Captain and his Officer Elite. Even as they were shifted, because they were going to be required to attend and witness, even if they couldn’t participate, one of them resisted. 

Chief Procurement Officer Anthony DiNozzo Senior shouted out, “Anthony! Junior! Are you going to stand by and let them do this to me? I’m your father, Junior!”

Tony clenched his fists and shut his eyes, turning his face away. He had nothing, absolutely nothing, to say to the vile monster who had murdered his mother, beat him nearly to death (or was it actual death?), used, abused, and sold him for stud, all in return for trivial favors and influence. 

Senior was warned by the militia guards to keep his trap shut if he didn’t want to spend the rest of the trial in a buffer. The man subsided, the cold calculating gleam in his eyes still shifting, reflecting his whirling mind was bent on calculating the best advantage. 

Those left in the witness box were the remainder of those who had been stranded behind on the City when Leon evacuated everyone else for his little coup. The Officers’ wives all elected to remain with their exiled husbands, to no one’s great surprise. Blair took pains to remind a couple of them that there was no requirement for them to ‘stand by their man’ if they wished to take their chances elsewhere… he couldn’t help but think their loyalty was misplaced, more in some cases than others. But none of them had any ties to the Elper colonists. Even if divorce was in the cards under the new order, they would stick it out with their people. And they had children, and grandchildren, to consider. Doris Kinsey did ask if they could change their minds, in the event that the rest of their families chose another path… and that prompted a number of the other wives to consider the possibilities. 

Blair nodded. “Of course. Just say the word.”

That set off another roaring protest from the Captain’s bubble. With a thought, Jack O’Neill set the profile of their dome to one way sound, so they could hear the ongoing Tribunal, but none of the rest of them would be subjected to their nonsense. Meanwhile, the wives were ushered to the shielded bleachers on the right to await events.

There was no surprise in what the rest of those abandoned on Atlantis decided to do. For Tom Morrow, Richard Woolsey and Steven Caldwell, it was a matter of duty. All felt a responsibility to do what they could to lead their people. They were all pretty sure they wouldn’t trust Kinsey or his toadies any further than they could throw them. Left to them, New Lantea would be a virtual prison island, the people reduced to slave status, forced to work while their ‘leadership’ sat back and enjoyed being catered to, like old-time pre-Exodus lords. If these three men, plus the ambitious Clayton Jarvis, saw this as an opportunity to take over, well, they could hardly do a worse job. When the people realized they were disenfranchised, exiled, stuck in a situation from which they had little to no escape… well, the next elections would no doubt see a changing of the old guard. 

As for Trent Kort… “Am I to presume Eli David will be given the same lack of choice as we were? He’ll be stuck here with the rest of us?”

Blair grimaced. “He will get his say, same as any of you… but… well. He is actually guilty of an unprovoked attack on a defenseless community. I expect his sentence will reflect that.”

An evil smile stretched across Kort’s face. “Oh, *good*. I’ll stay on New Lantea, thank you very much.”

Most of the others were quickly dealt with, seeing how little room they had to negotiate, and unable to stomach, at any cost, begging for a place among the despised Elpers. One by one, they made their choice, and were taken to the right-side bleachers.

Until it was the turn of Cora Jarvis, wife of Clayton. She was much younger than her husband, beautiful, charming, with an ATA-C gene, and a family with political aspirations who had insisted she be sacrificed to up-and-comer Jarvis… her sense of loyalty or obligation to her family had been dwindling, the longer she remained married to her cold-fish of a husband. Go with him into exile? Hell no! 

She studied the Alphas with some speculation, and said, “At one time, I had an ambition to become a shuttle mechanic and pilot. That was not considered a lofty enough goal for one of my… station. Instead, they thought I would be more use as a trophy wife to a politician. Dr. McKay, would you accept me as an apprentice, to learn to service your sizeable fleet?”

McKay sent an evil side-long grin at Jarvis, who was growling angrily. “Oh, I’m sure we can put you to work, Mrs. Jarvis.”

“That’s Cora Paddington, if you please. I believe I just divorced my husband.”

Blair grinned, feeling the elation running all through the woman. “Good for you, Ms Paddington.”

Cora took a seat in the Coalition section of the bleachers, giving a nod to Tony… a second (or maybe third) cousin. 

Last, it was the turn of Operations Tech Chuck Campbell. He bowed his head, then looked up pleadingly, mostly to Rodney McKay. 

“Please, sirs… I know… I know I could have protested even harder on behalf of the City… I know I’m Lantean, but… Please, can’t I return to the City? If I promise not to leave her? If I submit to whatever security checks or mental scans you want to do? If I continue as Ops tech? I have experience, after all… Does… does she refuse to allow me return to her, too?”

O’Neill and John Sheppard both heard the City speak kindly of her ops console tech. So in the end, Chuck was released and allowed to take a seat in the bleachers behind the Guardian Alphas, next to the excited and relieved Cora Paddington. 

Blair sighed, pleased. Yes, there should always be the opportunity for second chances, no matter who you were. You could always change your mind. And most of all, for the truly penitent… 

There must always be room for mercy. 

Å


	19. Chapter 19: He would have to remain on New Lantea with all the other losers.

Å 

In advance of this day, there had been a fair amount of discussion over who should be next, once the Officer Elite had been dealt with. Did they save the conspirators directly responsible for the attack on Abydos for last, to make sure everyone was witness to their judgment? Or did they take them next, the most problematic of the Lanteans? 

Tony knew that opinions had been varied. But he also knew why there were so many bleachers on the hillside, to accommodate more than just the few Elper representatives who took up the middle, in the first few rows, just behind the judges’ table. And why the right side and left side were under their own force shields, carefully designed by Rodney McKay to keep two large groups separate and under control. 

Rodney, together with Radek Zelenka, with armed sentinels at their backs, carefully sorted the various culling buffers, and released their contents from stasis, just a few at a time, filling up the left-side bleacher section under containment first. These held the SFs, almost a thousand of them. Each small group was thoroughly searched and disarmed as they appeared from the dematerialization beam, and told to take their seats. They were startled to appear under the guns of Elper militia, but it didn’t take long for them to realize Executive Officer Vance’s attempt at a coup may have worked, but his invasion plans for Abydos had not. There was little they could do about it now, but see what the Elpers had in store for them. The brighter and more aware ones didn’t hold out much hope. 

The larger right side and middle back bleacher sections were intended to hold the remainder of the Lantean population (with a few exceptions), the civilians and kids. This was both easier and harder, and took longer for the decanting process. The search for personal weapons was still necessary, although not many were found. But these people had been beamed into a buffer sometime late at night, thinking they were participating in yet another imaginary drill… only to wake up here, prisoners, having no idea what was going on, or what was about to happen. Although it had been a favorite scare-tactic of their leaders to warn that the Elpers vastly outnumbered them and might one day turn on them and attack the City, no one ever believed that would ever happen… until now. 

Protests, loud complaints, anger at this apparent assault, demands for explanations… It was all noise and confusion, giving the shamans present severe headaches. The militia, losing patience, was getting more and more rough with the released adult Lanteans. Several times, Blair had to use his Shaman Voice to call for quiet, request calm, and assure everyone their questions would soon be answered. All this took hours, to get everyone decanted, quelled, and organized into their seats. 

Tony craned and searched the many civilian groups to find them… his kids. He only caught brief glimpses, as they were overwhelmed and hidden behind larger adult bodies. All of them, all of the children, were upset, fractious, still on late-night time, missing their proper sleep, and especially irritable in their parent’s arms. Plus the general air of anxiety and alarm was getting to them, and no one had answers, adult assurances sounding hollow to everyone. 

Luna frowned and whispered to her mate. On the counselor’s platform, Mack also had a whispered conference as she frowned over the crowds. It was Chief Human Resources Officer Jenny Shepard who, with the nodded permission of Chegwidden, stood to make her case. It went a long way with the Alphas that she cared enough to speak for the parents struggling with their kids. 

“With respect,” Shepard began, and there was indeed some respect in the deference she showed, “these people were placed in the culling buffers late at night, told it was a drill… their kids are still in late-night mode, tired or woken out a sound sleep. They’re exhausted and cranky… and who can blame them? I expect these proceedings to take hours, perhaps all day, if not more than one. The kids shouldn’t have to be subjected to this. I suggest they either be placed back in the buffers…” and everyone cringed at the notion of trying to separate clingy, upset children from the safety and protection of their parents, only to have to deal with the exact same situation later, “or some other accommodation be made. Maybe wait until everyone has had a chance to rest?”

Luna stood up, something suddenly in her hands. 

“This is a Scamander Case. It contains accommodation for everyone. Beds, linens and blankets, food and drinks, as well as bathing and toilet facilities. The children can be safe, protected, quiet and comfortable… and have a proper rest while we are engaged in other concerns. You can decide among yourselves who should go with them as caretakers. Room will be made for all. Communication between those inside and outside can easily be provided. And a monitor inside will show the events here, so no one will miss anything. Is this acceptable?”

As a matter of fact, it was something of a thrill to the kids to experience one of the famed wonders of Magical technology. A case that was much bigger on the inside than the outside, could expand or contract at will, and reflect whatever environment was needed. Magical indeed. It went a long way to quelling whatever temper tantrums were threatening.

Babysitters and chaperones quickly sorted themselves out, most of them parents or teachers. The children were quickly hustled off to be swept into the too-small-looking suitcase… Again, Tony craned his neck to try and catch just a glimpse of any of his kids, as they passed him by… 

Then, one little voice set up a screech, and one little girl in midnight-black pig tails struggled to get to the bleachers. “Daddy! It’s you! I see you, Daddy!” She wrestled with her mother, teacher Wendy Miller, who frowned like thunder, not just resentful of the man who had given her a daughter at her demand, but actually hating him. Tony could feel that sentiment roll over him. But ignored it, too wound up in his little girl. At her cry, others perked up and began to join her, Kate and Timmy tugging on their minders, toddler Jimmy and infant Ellie setting up wailing protests. 

“Abby! Baby girl, I see you! By the Powers, you’re getting so big… hush, baby, don’t fret! Go with these people for now, it’s okay, you’ll be safe… have a rest… I’ll see all of you later, all of you, okay?”

Mothers Wendy and Zoe Keates were going to go with the kids, but the other mothers were not. And on all five women’s faces were complicated expressions… conflict, anger, fear, jealousy, doubt, guilt… a toxic mix of befuddling emotions that left them as confused and as upset as Tony. But when he turned to the five little ones, who all had his deep green eyes… 

All he felt was yearning, and love. They loved him. All five of his kids loved him. Right now, all they really wanted was to run to him and throw their arms around him, have him hold them tight. And, oh, how he wanted that, too!

So he bound all of his love for them, all his lonely need for them, up into a big fluffy emotional blanket, and threw it at them. It wrapped them up tight in the comfort of his affection and calmed them down, so they could be shuffled off with the rest of the kids. 

What he didn’t anticipate was that the same desperate desire caught their mothers too. A stunned Wendy Miller and Zoe Keates both disappeared into Luna’s case, while Paula Cassidy, Jeanne Benoit and EJ Barrett could only gasp and stare. It was with difficulty that they shook themselves free and retreated to the right-side shielded bleachers. But they couldn’t help but stare at the man they had been told, had assumed, had never questioned, was a brain-dead vegetable without emotions, desires, feelings of any kind. 

Oh, how wrong that was.

Å 

At last, everyone was finally settled in their proper places and ready to listen. The hillside bleachers under their containment domes were teeming with SFs and civilians, more than ready to get on with things. 

It was time for the Tribunal to resume. 

The last culling buffer was decanted into the witness box platform at the bottom of the vale, its inhabitants disarmed and told to sit and await their opportunities to speak.

Then Blair stood and turned to face the bleachers behind him, and held up his hands for attention. Then he began to speak. 

“First, I am Blair Sandburg, Alpha Shaman Prime of Novelle. This is Jim Ellison, Alpha Sentinel Prime of Novelle. You may recognize us both. You may also be familiar with these other people next to me, the Alpha Sentinel and Shaman pairs, Guardians of the provinces. We represent the Elper Coalition, pretty much everyone on Novelle who isn’t Lantean. 

“We are all here because of the events of the past few ten-days. Some of you will already be aware of some of these events, most of you are not. Please listen and attend. All will be explained, and you will all have an opportunity to speak in your own turn. 

“By the unanimous agreement of all the councils of the Elper Coalition, we twelve Guardian Alphas have been granted the right to make judgments in matters of high crime, perpetrated against our people. We have also been granted the mandate by the City of Atlantis to determine what should happen to each of you, as she is reluctant to welcome any of you back on her decks.

“For now, know that the City of Atlantis has been steadily drained of power over the two centuries since Landing. The problem has become acute in recent months, and little was done to slow the inevitable end of the City. At the conservative estimates of your own Science Division, there was less than one month of power remaining before the last ZPM was completely drained of power.”

This caused a loud explosion of denial, questions, demands… until AJ Chegwidden stood up on his platform and held up his hands. “It’s true, everyone. It’s all true. You know me, you know I wouldn’t lie about something like this. The City was doomed. We, the Officer Elite, and most of the Science Division, have known about this for years. Many of us tried to talk to the Captain and his Officers, to take the necessary measures to slow down the inevitable, to make plans, contingencies, for emergency evacuation… no one listened to us.”

Their JAG’s agreement did much to return order to the crowd. 

Blair resumed. “The last several Chief Science Officers offered many solutions to the power problems, including strict conservation, and looking for alternate power sources. All but a few of these reasonable, common sense suggestions, were denied. A few unoccupied sections of the City were closed down. That was all. The CSOs also ordered many emergency evacuation plans to be drafted, even designated this island, the Alpha Site, or New Lantea, as a fall-back position. Their advice to begin building infrastructure, housing, storage, a harbor, fields for crops… well in advance, so it would be ready when the time came… it was all denied. 

“Now, Executive Officer Vance and several others decided contingencies should be made, whether your Captain and the rest of your Officer Elite agreed or not. Officer Vance and his co-conspirators planned a coup. They took the already-drafted plans for evacuation, with a few… modifications, and under the guise of a drill, enacted their plans. One amendment they made was to leave your Officer Elite, and any other high-ranking Lanteans not included in their plot, on the City, abandoned. The other was not to relocate here, as originally planned, but to invade a defenseless community and take their settlement as their own. They chose to attack Abydos.”

This brought an awful silence, as everyone looked between the platforms where their leadership, both sides, awaited. 

“Vance’s criminal, unprovoked and heinous attempt to take Abydos by force of arms has failed. With the City all but deserted, we, the Elper Coalition, sent teams to take command of Atlantis, and remove the last of the Lanteans. 

“So. Here we all are.”

At this point, Chief Human Resources Officer Jenny Shepard stood up and held up a hand for permission from the judges. “May I ask,” she offered with a tentative air, eyes glancing over the bleachers, “what of the Gene Orphans? I can’t help but notice none of them are among the people so far brought before this Tribunal. I assume they were offered more options than the rest of our people? Where are they?”

“They have all elected to return to their Elper communities and families, and have been welcomed with open arms.”

Shepard seemed shocked and unnerved by this revelation, although Tony, for the life of him, had no idea why she should be caught so off-guard. “You mean… *none* of them wished to remain among us?”

“Not one,” Sandburg confirmed sternly. “And you know, you have only yourselves to blame for that. You didn’t exactly give them any reason to want to spend even one moment more in your company. Now, may we continue?”

Much chastened, Shepard sat down and nodded. 

Sandburg took a deep breath. “Yes. The Gene Orphans who were designated jumper pilots for the evacuation drill opted out of the invasion plans, and instead flew their jumpers to refuge at Cheyenne. They have all decided to return to their blood families. Those in the culling buffers they took with them also elected to return to us.

“Now. That brings us to the reason we are collected here, in this Court Venue. 

“It must be clear to all of you by now that the Novelle Charter is null and void. No Gene Mandate, no Lantean control of markets or trade, no overlords, basing their power and influence on possession of Atlantis. In its stead, until more formal negotiations can take place, we, the Guardian Alphas of Novelle, the designated representatives of the Elper Coalition, have decided that everyone has the right to determine where they will live, and with whom. This means that each of you, with some exceptions, will be offered the choice. To remain here on New Lantea to build a new settlement, or make a formal request to relocate with some other community. 

“The exceptions? If we judge that you were a willing participant in the invasion of Abydos, you will remain here. If we judge you are insincere in your promise to cooperate and live in peace with your new neighbors, you will remain here. If there is no community willing to take you in, you will remain here. Is that clear?”

Oh, it was. It really was. The wash of fear from the Lanteans in the stands behind him made Tony shudder. Both Vala and Amanda put reassuring hands on his shoulders, and Don glanced at him in concern. 

“Your Captain and his Officer Elite that you see sitting in these contained platforms, have already been assessed and their disposition determined. Atlantis herself has refused to allow them to return, as they have failed, catastrophically, to display the leadership, wisdom, duty, responsibility or care she deems necessary for her operation. And no, we won’t have them, either. So they stay here, in exile. 

“For those of you who remain, by choice or otherwise, this island, New Lantea, will be the new home of the Lantean people. Thanks to the evacuation preparations as part of Vance’s drill, supplies and equipment have already been brought here and decanted, organized and stored, ready for you to establish yourselves. There should be more than enough to ensure your survival, including sufficient weapons to protect yourselves from goa’uld incursions. But no more than that. No explosives, culling buffers or jumpers, nothing you can use to attack us again. We will leave a communication device, so you can call for help in case of emergency. More than that… is up to you, and how you decide to deal with the rest of us.

“But, for now, the reason we decanted all of you and set up this Venue, is so that you could witness for yourselves the proceedings against the Abydos invaders, and make your own choices.” Blair pointed out the counselor’s platform. “Your elected JAG, AJ Chegwidden, has agreed, with his staff and these few members of your leadership, to represent your interests, provide counsel and advice to each and every one of you who requests it.” 

Å 

Next up was Vance and his cohorts. 

Leon himself took his situation stoically, with just a glance toward the bleachers, where his wooden-faced wife sat. Their two children were on the other end of a comm unit into the Scamander Case, but silent as the kids slept on, oblivious. 

“I make no apologies for myself,” he declared brazenly. “It was clear to *all* of us in the upper ranks that the City was going to fail… sooner rather than later. There was a perfectly viable plan in place to save us all, but through the sheer incompetence, greed and denial of the leadership, nothing had been done to prepare.”

“I’m sorry,” an irate Daniel Jackson interrupted. “But aren’t you the Exec Officer? Second in Command? Are you saying there was nothing you could do to force the issue?”

“I tried! I was overruled, not only by my Captain,” and Vance barely held back a sneer, “but the entire Officer Elite, who all claimed to agree with Kinsey, that we would only create panic if we made any effort to evacuate. We were fast running out of time. I had no choice but to take matters into my own hands.”

“Perhaps so,” Blair granted. “But then you decided not to relocate here, as planned, but to invade a defenseless colony. Abydos. What of that decision?”

Leon shrugged, and decided to throw his co-conspirators under the bus. “I couldn’t do it all alone. I needed allies. And *none* of them would have been on board if Alpha Site, an uninhabited desert isle with absolutely no structures in place, was the stated destination. We needed a settlement already built, and enough resources in place to retain our position and influence on Novelle. Abydos would have given us that.”

Ellison heard a whispered request, and nudged Blair, who nodded to Kasuf, Elder of Abydos. 

“And what of my people, Lantean? What did you intend to do with us?”

“It was no part of the plan to harm anyone, unless we were forced to…”

Skarra shouted out, “Forced to? Thieves who came in the night felt they would be *forced* to harm us for defending our own?”

Vance set his mouth grimly, then continued, “We were going to sweep you all into buffers and move you here.”

Skarra bristled, standing at his father’s side. “With no shelter? No food? No weapons to protect against the goa’uld? And what of our mastage herds? Our people are trained to command, calm and care for them. They are vital to our survival. You have no knowledge of them at all. What of them?”

Vance, not understanding the passionate attitude toward a bunch of herd beasts, shrugged. “We didn’t need them. We had shuttles for transport. I guess we would have set them loose.”

“They would have gone feral and died in their droves without us!”

Blair shook his head, recognizing that the Lanteans never would understand. “Enough. It’s bad enough you would have stranded over two thousand people here, to sink or swim. At least we are leaving you supplies to support and equipment to build, not to mention basic hand and personal weapons.”

Again, Vance shrugged. “Maybe they would have been alone for a few days… then you Elpers would have come to help them out. Taken them someplace safe, fed ‘em. Not really our problem.”

That flummoxed a lot of people… including those in the stands. 

Blair shook his head. “Well then. I suppose you won’t be too surprised if we decide your fate the same way. You chose this. Exile, to New Lantea.”

Vance was shuffled over to the platform with the Captain and his cronies… there were angry faces and waving arms, but no actual violence, and thanks to the dome silencer, no need for anyone to listen to the loud recriminations. 

Eli David, stone-faced, refused to speak. He was moved in his turn to the Officer Elite platform, while Trent Kort, in the right-side bleacher section, smirked at him. Makepeace explained his part in the coup was pretty much after the fact, but that he had agreed with the choice of Abydos. He was stoic about his sentence and merely nodded. He didn’t imagine he would have much choice of another home port in any case. The entire Officer Elite would never find acceptance anywhere else on Novelle. He also was relegated to Kinsey’s platform. To the accusing stares, he could only shrug, and take his seat.

Commander Leroy Jethro Gibbs was another who took his medicine in silence and with a stone-face. Although, as he was shuffled to join Kinsey and Vance, he did just glance Tony’s way… 

It was no surprise that Ziva David, and Eli’s chosen officers, Rivkin, Cruz and Blackadder, elected to remain on New Lantea. Ziva was insistent on joining her father on his platform, ever his staunchest support and bodyguard, but the others didn’t much care, one way or the other. They ended up in the left-side bleacher section. As one after another of the eight command staff who had been taken in the Nagada Gate Tower were processed, they all seemed too demoralised to even think of making choices, merely followed, sheep-like, to the left-side bleachers. 

Until it was Dr. Peter Kavanagh’s turn. McKay sneered in contempt at the man who had been a burr in his side for so long. The man was a whiner, and had never taken responsibility for any of his actions, or plentiful mistakes. This was the man who had slipped him the potentially lethal citrus fruit that had triggered his emergence as shaman. Maybe he owed the scientist thanks for that… if it hadn’t been such a traumatic and painful experience, writhing on the floor of his lab, throat and lungs constricting, cutting off air, choking him to death. 

Sure enough, and true to form, Kavanagh vacillated between bravado, complaints and pleadings. 

“You can’t strand me here with these cretins! I’m the best scientist you have. Without the City, you have no use for that damned ATA Gene, and you can put me in charge of the sciences, as it should have been from the beginning! It’s only because I don’t have that damn Gene that other, lesser men took my rightful place! I’m close to developing an override for the Gene controls anyway… you need me to complete my work, and I can’t do that here, on a damned frontier colony! I need lab space, equipment, power… And none of this was my idea, anyway. Not the coup, not the invasion… that had nothing to do with me, it wasn’t my decision, I’m a scientist not a military man, and if they had listened to me maybe they would have won. I’m only in this mess because of Vance and David… I don’t deserve to be treated like this! Surely someone out there must recognise my value and want to take me in!”

The rant rose to a crescendo, and Chegwidden, sighing deeply, shouted at the man to get his attention, difficult to do, and then advised him to shut up. And he was hustled off to the left-side bleachers with the military and other invasion participants.

One by one, the members of the Security Force Division were run through the process. Some protested ignorance (they didn’t know) or impotence (they were under orders), but only a few of those passed the sentinel test for truthfulness. The vast majority were quite able to see the writing on the wall. They had had a few hours, after all, to realise their situation, and the full consequences of the failed invasion. With Vance’s callous attitude toward the Abydons, they could expect little in the way of leniency from any Elper. There were desperate times ahead for their people, and most of them had enough loyalty and sense of responsibility and duty to the people to stay and serve the Lanteans, even without their City. Or, perhaps, especially without their City. 

There were still one or two who made an effort to fool the Alphas. They claimed ignorance. They claimed sympathy for the Elpers. They promised to be forever loyal to any who would take them in. They never wanted to be SFs, they were forced to it by family pressure… 

And they lied. It was obvious. A few were well known as the primary bullies who had always taken special delight at every opportunity, in hazing and abusing the Gene Orphans on the City. With so little respect in them, they had imagined it would be a simple thing to fool a bunch of freaks and escape the hard times ahead. None of them succeeded. 

There was one special case, and Blair and the others had deliberately kept him for last. When all the other SFs were done, Blair called on a woman in the bleachers near Tony and his friends. An older woman rose and came forward. 

“Alpha Prime Sandburg, I’m Joanna Teague. I was a Gene Orphan on the City, serving as an analyst in the Intel unit. And I’m Ned Dorneget’s mother.” 

Joanna hadn’t been one of Eli’s favorites, simply because of his envy of her having the Gene, but she had been wily enough not to attract his attention, either, as too good or too ambitious. She had kept her head down and done the minimum necessary to keep her place. When Radek had approached her about their Decision Point Plan B, as she was one of those strong enough to pilot a shuttle, she had thought long and hard about whether to include her beloved son. But Ned had been an honest young man with a firm sense of duty and a future in the SFs, and even his mother wasn’t sure where his ultimate loyalty might lie. But now… Joanna was returning to her DeeCee family, and wanted her son to come with her. 

She explained all this, and turned to her son. 

“Ned. Please. Come with me. These people aren’t worth your loyalty. Come home. Please.”

Ned glanced around, at his superior officer Gibbs with the grim and cold demeanor… at Franks, who had eyed him up like a steak sandwiched when it looked like they might be trapped in a shuttle for days under the sand… at his other mates, who had always looked down on his Gene Orphan origins… and then at Abigail Borin, who smiled at him and hiked her chin toward his mother. 

“I… Please. I chose sanctuary.”

Blair smiled. “Granted.”

There were boos and cat-calls, of course, but Ned didn’t care. They came from the very same bastard bullies who had made his apprentice trainee days a living hell.

Å 

The day dragged on, and, at one point, Ellison merely stood up and held up his hands for attention. 

“Okay, by now you all know the score. You have two choices here. Stay on New Lantea, or ask some Elper province to accept you. Those of us here have the authority to grant sanctuary to anyone who appeals to us, once we have verified your honesty. And at this point, it serves no purpose to make you all sit there and wait your turn. So. Those of you wanting to stick with the Lanteans on New Lantea, if you have kids, over here to the Scamander Case. You can wait with them, rest, get something to eat. Whatever.”

Wendy Miller and Zoe Keates were already inside the Case, but now they were joined by Jackie Vance (with a brief acid glare thrown at her husband), Jeanne Benoit and EJ Barrett. All of them being from old Lantean families, some with parents who were actual members of the Officer Elite, it would have been nearly impossible for them to chose anything else but exile. 

Jim assessed the dwindling numbers in the right-side bleachers. “Hands up, those of you who want to apply for sanctuary with an Elper community? Come on down to the witness box and we’ll get you sorted now.”

There was a depressingly small number of people who raised hands at this point. Tony could only imagine the rest were confused, overwhelmed and not thinking straight, caught up by a misplaced sense of loyalty, too bigoted against Elpers to want anything to do with them no matter the circumstances, or in denial about the true state of affairs. 

A few who were apparently considering changing their minds migrated to the lowest level benches, nearest the portal that could be opened to let them out. One of those was Selena Cassidy, wife of Chief Logistics Officer Barton Cassidy, who had noted well that her daughter Paula was one of those who had joined the sanctuary applicants in the witness box.

Paula couldn’t help glancing back at Tony, time and again. When her turn came, she glanced also at her mother, and her father Barton, stuck with the rest of the Officer Elite. A dutiful daughter, this would be hard for her… but she had other considerations. 

Like her mother, she had no ATA Gene. Quite content as an SFD tech engaged in weapons maintenance, her father had been ambitious enough for both of them. Hence his bid for a Gene-carrier grandchild, at the cost of owing Anthony DiNozzo Senior a hell of a favor. Paula had been leery, reluctant… and disgusted at the treatment the man imprisoned in her bed-chamber had received… regardless of his actual state of mind, or lack of one. 

But the gift of her beloved Caitlin… 

She had been proud to give birth to a child of such unprecedented Gene strength. She had been well and truly smitten with her small bundle of joy, and threw herself into the role of mother with enthusiasm. But she had become alarmed when it became clear that the City had told Kate who her father was, and the little girl began asking uncomfortable questions. She had been distressed to find her daughter was often in the company of DiNozzo Junior’s other offspring… 

When Anthony DiNozzo Junior had emerged so suddenly and startlingly as a shaman… well. It was a shock to everyone. But particularly to the women who had once been married to him. It shouldn’t have been, maybe… Paula had once or twice caught just a suggestion from him of the abject misery he felt… 

But today, in this place, confronting his children for the very first time… 

Yeah, shock didn’t even cover it. Paula was nothing less than appalled by what she had done. And if… if… the sheer strength and purity of his unconditional love for his kids… for Abby, Kate, the others… how did she have any right to deny a parent that? It was more than she had ever felt from her own father, and it sickened her to think she could even think to deprive her little Kate of a chance at such love. 

No. She couldn’t do it. She wouldn’t. 

“Please, Alphas, Mr. Chegwidden… I… I can’t. My daughter, Caitlin, is Tony DiNozzo Junior’s daughter too. I know I have no right… what I did… what we all did… how we treated him… It was wrong, I know. A true evil, and none of us even realized, or if we did, cared… Tony, I can’t tell you how sorry I am for going along with it all… but one thing I can’t, will never regret, is my daughter. Please, sirs, ma’ams… let me and my daughter go wherever Tony goes. Let us be together, a family, whatever way we can. I won’t keep Kate from her father. Neither of them deserve that. Tony, she’s wanted to meet you for so long… all her life… I want her to have that. Please. If not for my sake, for hers.”

Tears in his eyes, Tony could only nod, unable to even speak his gratitude that Paula would allow him this. He could hope… but he doubted he would have as much generosity from the other women he had been married to, expressly for the purpose of producing offspring. 

Blair smiled and nodded. “Sanctuary is granted, Paula Cassidy, for you and little Kate.”

Tony could only huff a heavy breath of relief, the grin on his face big enough for two. His friends clapped him on the back, caught in the wash of his sheer unshielded joy. 

“Sirs and ma’ams,” called Selena Cassidy from the right-side bleachers in her turn. “You promised we could change our minds. Well, I have. I want to go wherever my daughter and grandchild end up. Please?” 

“Granted.”

Paula wept happy tears on her mother’s shoulder as they met in the space outside the bubbles. “Is it okay if we join Kate, for now? Tony... we’ll see you later. We need to talk, I know…”

Tony nodded. “It’ll be okay, Paula. We can do this. For Kate.”

“For Kate.”

Å 

When Gordon Miller stepped up to the front of the witness box, his mousey wife Barbara at his side, Alpha Shaman Spencer Reid was hard pressed not to bristle with anger. His sentinel partner, feeling his churning emotions, frowned darkly, and paid particular attention to this man. 

The Millers were also an old Lantean family. The current patriarch, Chief Operations Officer Lewis Miller, was nothing if not a typical example of the breed. His wife Loretta had a weak ATA-D gene, not much stronger than his own, but none of his four children had any at all. The only way they could maintain the family influence and rise in the ranks was through marriage, or producing a Gene-positive child. Violet and Jasper were too young to marry yet, and not particularly bright, even by Miller clan standards. Violet had been streamed into the Maintenance and Service Division, only her family name making her the head of a housekeeping unit, rather than anything even less exalted. She was depending upon her name and pretty face to win her a more advantageous marriage in some hazy future. Jasper, of course, had been sent to the Security Force Division. He was still a trainee, might always be a trainee.

Lewis had higher hopes for his other two children, Gordon and Wendy. 

Wendy had eagerly fallen into his plans for taking advantage of DiNozzo Junior’s Gene. She was inordinately proud of producing an ATA-A child, which tended to make her smug, even in that family. Whether young Abby sensed that her mother was more interested in her child’s Gene than her actual child… well. The little girl was showing signs of also having her father’s sensitivity to emotions around her. 

Gordon had taken himself a trophy wife from another prominent family, the Keates line, although her own ATA-D gene was pretty weak. Their first child had none at all, to the disappointment of both families. 

Which was when Gordon hatched his scheme to force a Gene Orphan into having his child, and then handing her over to him and Barbara to raise, ostensibly as their own. He chose for his victim a teenager who had recently been outted as a Gene-carrier and brought to the City under the Gene Mandate. His father Lewis had gone to great lengths to assist in the plot. No records showed who Michelle Lee’s real family were, or where she came from. They had been erased or overwritten… or so the Millers and their ally Peter Kavanagh supposed, although Atlantis had herself made true back-ups. But when Amanda was born, complete with an impressive ATA-B, Gordon claimed the baby was his by an unknown Elper woman who wished to remain anonymous, and had also been Michelle’s mother by an equally unknown and unregistered Lantean father. Making Michelle and Amanda half-sisters, rather than mother and daughter.

It was an overly complicated lie, but Gordon was determined that no one outside his immediate family would know his daughter was the child of a despised Gene Orphan. She was the future of the Miller family, and he gained credit with his own ambitious father for that very fact. The best he could do was limit exposure of his daughter to the Elper-woman who bore her.

Michelle, when decanted along with the SFs who had held her prisoner in Nagada, had remained quietly in the background, waiting for her one chance. 

Gordon was furious. He felt betrayed. His father had clearly blundered, to have lost them the City in such a way. His siblings were all losers. Even Wendy was no more than a teacher of kids. How was that any credit to the Miller name? Like his buddy Peter Kavanagh, he had taken a shot at the Sciences, and had picked the easy course of social studies. Stealing other people’s ideas as his own and faking the rest had come easy to him. Everything came easy to him. And so it should. He was a Miller of Atlantis.

And now here they were, being judged by damn *Elpers*! Well, the hell with that! So the Gene no longer mattered in a world without the City? Fine. Good. It was out of power and no doubt about to tip over and sink? Well, it had been good while it lasted, but no longer an option as a power base, obviously. He let it go without a thought. If it was down to exile on this lump of ground in the middle of nowhere, or making a bid for some settlement he could soon take over as his own? No contest. 

All he had to do was fool this bunch of cretins that he was innocent and worth a better life among them… Piece of cake. 

But as soon as he stood before the Alphas, standing straight in his arrogance and assurance that all would go his way… They recoiled. All of them. 

Even as he went into his pitch, practiced in the hours they had all been waiting in the bleachers, beginning to sweat as he saw all too clearly it wasn’t working… 

“You don’t remember me, do you?” challenged Spencer Reid, Alpha Shaman of Pastureland. Trying for a place in DeeCee had been his first choice. 

“Of course I do, Dr. Reid. You were a scientist on the City, until you emerged as shaman.”

“Yes, but when we met, I was a six-year-old child in school. You were in the class three grades ahead of mine… well, before I was advanced.”

Yes, and didn’t that still rankle, that snot-nosed little Elper charging ahead so far and so fast? Outclassing all of them with his brain and memory and Gene. He and Kavanagh had *despised* the little bastard! And pretty much been allowed to do what they pleased, when none of the Gene Orphan minders cared enough to notice. 

Gordon gave a smarmy smile, shaking his head. “We were kids. It was just a bit of fun. You don’t still hold a grudge, do you, Spencey?”

Spencer’s eyes narrowed at the name. His sentinel positively growled. Okay, so maybe Pastureland was off the table, Gordon thought. Still left a lot of room. LA didn’t even have an alpha pair… their Councilors there would never know the difference if he made a bid for the wide open spaces of their far-flung and isolated villages. Yes, maybe that was a better starting point. He could start out by taking over a small village, and then slowly build himself an empire. By the time anyone noticed, he would be unstoppable. He eyed the LA group, and gave an ingratiating smile. 

Sentinel Edgerton leaned over several shoulders to whisper in the ears of Lange, Granger and Eppes. 

McKay, meanwhile, that turn-coat Lantean, tapped on a tablet in his hands – stolen Atlantis tech, no doubt. 

“I see someone had been a naughty boy,” McKay gloated with a dangerous smile. “You got your father and your buddy Kavanagh to alter a lot of files, didn’t you, boyo? Or outright delete them. Atlantis doesn’t like that very much. She makes back-ups of everything for herself, were you aware of that? No? Michelle Lee a first generation, not a Gene Orphan herself? Oh, really? No record of the daughter she bore about eight years ago? But plenty of records for your daughter Amanda… Not all of them entirely accurate? I have a DNA test on file from the City’s back-up server that her parents are you and Michelle Lee, not some unknown and non-existent Elper. How do you explain that?”

Gordon paled, his mouth opening and closing like a fish. 

Michelle took her cue. 

“Amanda is mine! My daughter! He forced me to… he offered me… he was going to… he promised the world if I would let him… I was just a teenager, alone, stripped from my family, with no one to help me! But once Amanda was born, he forced me to deny her! He would never let me see her again, unless I lied, told everyone I was her sister, not her mother. Please, Alphas! Let me have my daughter back! He doesn’t love her, he just wanted a Gene-carrier. Barbara actually hates her, because she’s mine, not hers. They almost never see her, but stick her with nannies and babysitters. She asks me why they don’t love her! She asks me why they love their own kids, but not her. What am I supposed to tell her? 

“I sabotaged the shuttle they had me pilot for the drill, because I couldn’t go with the other Gene Orphans, to escape… I couldn’t leave my daughter, and I knew if the Lanteans won in Abydos, I’d never see her again. I messed up my escape with Charlie and the others because I couldn’t leave Amanda. Please, I don’t care where we go, just give her back to me!”

Blair Sandburg leaned back, satisfied. “Now *that*, that is one hundred percent the truth. Michelle, you can go to the Scamander Case to be with Amanda. Once we get to the kids, we’ll ask her where she wants to go, with the Millers or with you. Her choice. If it’s with you? We’ll make it happen. You can have sanctuary anywhere you may want to go. Ch’in will certainly have you back. As for you, Mr. Miller… You’re free to ask anyone up here, of course, if they’ll offer you sanctuary. I’m afraid I decline, on behalf of Cascade.”

“I decline, most adamantly, for Pastureland,” Spencer declared.

“Ditto for Hellsmouth,” Willow jumped in. 

“Not a chance in hell,” Daniel assured when Gordon merely glanced his way, “Stargate Commune is a definite no.”

McKay sniffed. “I’d almost rather have Kavanagh, the greasy git, and he tried to murder me! It would be inviting a Vance clone to try and take over one of our islands.”

Luna gave her vague, benevolent smile. “You wouldn’t be at all happy in Hogwarts, Mr. Miller. Not when you hate Magicals more than you do other Elpers.”

Councilor Hetty Lange merely shook her head. “I have been advised that it would be unwise for us to accept you to LA at this time,” she said. 

Considerably disgruntled, Gordon and his shadow of a wife were sent to the Scamander Case. They did have children in there, after all, much as it made his skin crawl to enter a freaky Magical device. They would have to wait there for Amanda’s decision, as to whether she would stay or go. 

Then he was doomed. He would have to remain on New Lantea with all the other losers.

Å


	20. Chapter 20: Epilogue: "But worth it. Definitely worth it."

Å 

Before those in the Scamander Case were freed, those in the bleacher containment fields were swept up in a culling buffer, along with the Officer platform, and all but AJ, Harm and Mack from counsel platform. 

Behind the scenes, militia volunteers had been working to pack up the waiting jumpers with everything they were taking with them… not just those granted sanctuary, but the empty culling buffers and extra generators. The various limited shields were taken down and left in the storage cavern, as were the confiscated weapons taken from the Lanteans. They had promised the exiles hand weapons for protection, after all. They could only hope the Lanteans wouldn’t start turning them on each other.

Once the last of the Lanteans were processed, the last holding buffers would be emptied, of people and the livestock, from a considerable distance above, and they would leave the exiles to their own devices. A map would be provided, to show them where the storage cavern was, and the Court Venue Vale. The large amphitheater space, equipped with seating for five thousand, would be a perfect communal gathering place, when the Lanteans decided to hold elections… or however they should choose to govern themselves.

But, before that, the last member of the Officer Elite had something to say. 

“We’ve talked of this before, Harm, Mack and I, and we all want to plea for sanctuary. I’m a Gene Orphan, and have family in DeeCee… or I used to. Harm is first gen, with cousins in Stargate Commune. Mack doesn’t much care where she goes, but with a name like Mackenzie, I’d guess she’d prefer the Cascade Highlands, given a choice. I know we served the Officer Elite… hell, I was elected one. But we are servants of justice and the rule of law, before anything else, all three of us. It doesn’t matter to us whether we do that on the City, among the Elper provinces, or wherever. It’s our calling, as much as being a shaman, a healer or a sentinel. So… what’s it to be? Can we continue to serve the law of Novelle, maybe help to draft a new, better, more just Charter, or will we do that here, with the exiles? The Powers know they need someone to rein ‘em in… if only they’d allow it.”

Exchanging glances, the shamans conferred and nodded. 

Blair said, “If you wish to join us in Cascade, Sarah Mackenzie, you would be welcome.”

“Thank you,” Mack breathed on a sigh of relief. She hadn’t let herself believe she stood a chance, and she could only imagine what pariahs the three of them would be among the Lanteans after this. 

Spencer said, “My sentinel can always use some help, wrangling the militia of DeeCee and Quantico, Mr. Chegwidden. He is especially determined to teach ethics and protocols to the Academy students. You are welcome among us.”

Daniel offered, “I’ve heard you’re quite a jumper pilot, Mr. Rabb. We can certainly use a few like you. Welcome to Stargate Commune.”

“Inviting in a damn lawyer, Daniel?” Jack O’Neill whined. 

“Don’t be an ass, Jack.”

Å 

A few militia volunteers had gone into the Scamander Case, to assist in sorting people to leave. Those granted sanctuary with their kids were taken first. Paula and Selena Cassidy with little Caitlin were among those. When asked by a gentle Blair, Amanda Miller had been only too happy to leave her Miller relatives behind, and join her mother in returning to Ch’in. It seems Atlantis had told the child who her real mother was, so that came as no surprise to the youngster. 

Then came the flood of those in exile, including the Millers, Jackie Vance and her kids. 

But last in the line, at Blair’s special request, were the special cases. Wendy Miller, Jeanne Benoit, EJ Barrett and Zoe Keates may all have chosen exile with their families, but what of their kids? Tony had begged for, and been granted, the right to finally meet his own children. If he managed to convince any of them to take Paula Cassidy’s option… 

He leaped down from the bleachers as soon as they began to emerge from Luna’s Case. He fell on them with laughter and huge gulping breaths on sobs of joy, tears streaming from his eyes.

“By the Powers… Powers, I love you, kids. I need you to know that. Abby, Kate, Tim, Jimmy… you too little Elly-belly. I love all of you, sooo much…”

“Can we come live with you, Daddy? We all love you too. Can’t we live with you now? Because we’ve met you, and we all love each other, and we’re family, and… and…” Even Abby, in her excitement and joy, could barely catch enough breath to say all she wanted. 

“I… what about your moms, Abby? Won’t they be sad if you leave them?”

Abby glanced warily back at Wendy, not really sure if that was true.

Wendy glared and spat out, “You do *not* get to take my child away, DiNozzo! We have a contract with Senior. You lost all rights to Abby when he signed for you.”

AJ Chegwidden, lingering near, coughed a little for attention. “Yes, DiNozzo Senior signed *for* his son… but obviously, Tony has the right to make his own contracts. Anything Senior might have signed on his behalf may not be entirely legal. May I suggest a compromise? As with any divorce, custody agreements can be worked out for any children. What if we negotiate visitation rights? For Tony to come here, with proper safeguards in place, of course, and for the kids to join him, wherever he should decide to settle?”

“Yes yes yes!” Abby agreed, jumping up and down. “Visits! Lots and lots of visits!”

“Me too!” Timmy put in anxiously, terrified of being left out. “I want visits too, Daddy! Please, mommy?”

Wendy might have objected, even in the face of her excited daughter, her own expression curdling like milk in lemon juice, but Jeanne Benoit only had to look at her son’s soulful green eyes to fold immediately. 

“Yes, of course, Timothy. We can arrange visits whenever you like.”

Jimmy, shy and at just three years old, didn’t really understand what was going on, or have the language skills to make his own wishes known, although all the shamans could feel his happiness in Tony’s aura, and reluctance to let go. And Ellie, who had been howling and upset whenever she hadn’t actually been asleep, the whole time she had been in the Scamander Case, had quieted immediately as soon as Tony took her into his arms. She stared up at him with vivid green eyes, content just to feel him near. 

EJ Barrett and Zoe Keates were no more proof against their children than Jeanne. 

Jim Ellison sighed. “Visitation to and from New Lantea? The logistics are going to be a bitch,” he commented. 

Blair smiled, watching Tony with his children. “But worth it. Definitely worth it.”

Å

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know, I didn’t intend for this to be a multi-parter when I started, but then I got this far, and it seemed like this half of the story was told… how the good guys re-took the City. But that leaves, of course, some loose ends… the Stargate, the Wraith and the Goa’uld, not to mention, Tony’s complicated personal life. Plus, I had intended the *Puddle Jumper* to make a complete circuit of the Provinces… LA, Pastureland, Hellmouth and Hogwarts. And then just dropping the Lanteans on their Exile Island seemed like it begged the story of how they got their act together… or didn’t… and how do the Elpers sort out what happens to Atlantis now? All this and more… is going to have to fit in a separate story. 
> 
> Wash your hands, keep your distance, wear the damn mask. Stay safe, stay well.


End file.
